And So Was I
by We're All M-M-Mad Here
Summary: For the first eighteen years of my life, nothing happened. Nothing at all, not ever. But I wasn't to know that the days were coming that I would never forget. The days of the Doctor. A man who could change his face, a man who could feel the turn of the universe, even save it with only a kettle and a piece of string. These are the days of Lily Tyler...and you watch me run.
1. The Doctor Meets the Tylers

**Author's Note: Lily looks like Britt Robertson. I want to try and make sure this isn't a typical Rose's sister where they basically just replace Rose, I want to make sure there is a balance, integrating Lily into the Doctor's life, but in such a way that doesn't make Rose any less important or any less brilliant. I hope I do that.**

Chapter One

_When the Doctor Met the Tylers_

_For the first eighteen years of my life, nothing happened. Nothing at all, not ever. But I wasn't to know that the days were coming that I would never forget. The days of the Doctor. A man who could change his face, a man who could feel the turn of the universe, even save it with only a kettle and a piece of string. The days were coming of travel and rescue and sacrifice, and yes, the days of running. When you run with the Doctor, it feels like it'll never end. These are the days of Lily Tyler…and you watch me run. _

"Lily!"

The girl in question, Lily, groaned and shifted slightly beneath her blue floral duvet, but other than that didn't reply to the shout.

"Lily! Lils, you gotta get ready for work!"

Lily groaned again, but this time she sat up, smacking her lips slightly at the cottony sensation in her mouth. She blinked her blue eyes tiredly and ran a hand through her wavy blonde hair, which was slightly matted from sleep.

"I'm up, Rose," Lily called back.

This is how it had been since she left college six months ago. Her elder sister, Rose, set an alarm for 7:30 to wake herself up and then crossed the hallway to wake up Lily so they could both catch the bus to work at Henricks, the clothes store. Lily pulled on a pair of pale blue skinny jeans, a stripy blue, green and red top that showed just a strip of her midriff, a grey jacket and the grey converse that she wore no matter what.

When Lily left her bedroom and went into the living room of the Tyler's three bedroom flat, she was met by her mother sitting on the settee clad in her silky pink dressing gown watching telly and Rose rushing about.

"Lily, come on, hurry up, we're running late!" Rose said while stuffing things in her denim bag.

"How can we be running late?" Lily asked, her brows furrowing, as she grabbed her own bag, which was on the kitchen counter, and checked that everything she needed was in it. "You've only just woken up."

"You ask me this every morning," said Rose, handing their mum, Jackie, a cup of tea off the side, "and once again it's because you wouldn't wake up. Now come on"

"But I haven't had any breakfast, I'm hungry," Lily whined, resisting Rose's attempts to get her to leave and trying to get towards the kitchen.

Rose sighed in exasperation.

"Err, here," Rose said, grabbing an apple from a bowl on the side and tossing it at Lily, who caught it with a bemused look but decided it was better than nothing.

Rose quickly kissed their mum on the cheek before grabbing Lily, who was about to take a bite out of the apple, by the wrist to drag her out the door, barely giving her enough time to grab her bag and sling it over her shoulder.

"See you later!" their mum called after them.

By the time Lily and Rose had rushed down the stairs from their flat and to the nearest bus station in the Powell Estate, Lily had finished her apple. She leaned against the metal bars on the bus stop and watched her sister looking up and down the street for any sign of their bus.

"'We're gonna be late' she said, 'you always wake up late' she said," Lily said sarcastically, "and here we are, waiting at a bus stop."

Rose rolled her eyes but a toothy smile appeared on her face, the same smile that Lily shared with her.

"Shut up," Rose laughed, moving to lean against the metal bars with her younger sister and Lily let out a small laugh as well.

Her laughter soon fade and Lily let out a sigh, slumping against the glass of the bus stop and looking up the street for the bus. It still wasn't here. She sighed again.

"You know, I'm going to buy a car one of these days, and we'll never have to hang about for the bus again," Lily declared, just as she had on several other occasions.

Rose laughed.

"Good luck with that," said Rose with a smile. "Working at Henricks you'd be lucky to buy a bike."

Lily grimaced but nodded in agreement. Unlike Rose, who had dropped out of college for her ex-boyfriend Jimmy Stone, Lily actually finished her A-levels. She wanted to be a psychiatrist, had since she was a little girl. She had always been fascinated with how people's minds worked, she liked to understand them, not necessarily sympathise or pity people, but at least understand. However, it turns out finding a job that involved psychology was a lot harder than she thought.

"Here we go," Rose said, straightening up as the bus pulled over to the side for them to board.

Lily stared out the window as she and Rose claimed spare seats on the double-decker. There were cars and people everywhere, going about their daily lives in central London. She wondered what each person's stories were, whether they were happy or lonely. How many people did she pass every day that had lives entirely their own, their own stories, stories that certainly had to be more interesting than her own mundane life.

How many of these people would truly make a difference and how many would slide by unnoticed? That was exactly the reason why she tried to get to know everyone she came into contact with. For example, the woman in the corner shop, Joan, was have marriage troubles because her husband had cheated on her, but since she's pregnant they're trying to give it another go, and she had only spoken to the woman twice.

"Lily," Rose said, nudging her arm.

Lily looked up in surprise to see that Rose was standing and then looked out the window to see that they were nearly there and she stood up too. They stood by the doorway, holding onto the metal bar, until the bus pulled to a stop outside a department store and they hopped off. Once the double decker pulled away, the Tyler sisters quickly cross the street to go to Henricks.

Henricks wasn't the most exciting job, in fact, it was downright tedious. She spent her day folding clothes and then carrying them to place on the correct shelves, helping customers by pointing out where they could find things, and then folding clothes again. Lily sometimes wondered whether she should just quit, thinking maybe it would give her more motivation to find a job she could actually enjoy, but she quickly turned the thought down: what if she just ended up unemployed and broke? Her mum couldn't exactly cover for her forever. So Lily just through herself into the job with as much eagerness as she could, she always tried to put one hundred per cent into everything she did, no matter how useless it may seem.

"Hello, do you work here?" a Scottish voice asked.

Lily turned and saw that it was a ginger woman, looking a few years older than herself, with long legs and a short skirt. Lily smiled and looked down at the stack of pink jumpers in her arms, which she had just been about to put on a shelf to her right.

"Well, either that or I'm about to try on every size of pink jumper in the store," she quipped, chuckling slightly and the ginger woman smiled. "What can I help you with?"

"Yes, where are the bow ties?" the woman asked.

Lily's brows rose in surprise.

"Bow ties," she repeated slowly, looking the woman up and down. "You don't exactly seem the type."

The woman laughed.

"Oh, I'm not," she said. "I dragged my friend over here, he's not too fond of shopping you see, thinks it's too domestic, so I thought I'd get him a bow tie"

"Ahh," Lily smiled, nodding in understanding. "A reward. Got to do something to keep the men well trained"

The woman laughed again and Lily began to walk towards where the different types of ties were, the woman walking alongside her.

"I like you," the woman said. "I'm Amy"

"I like you too," Lily chucked. "I'm Lily. Are you visiting from Scotland, Amy?" she asked curiously.

"Oh no, I'm from Leadworth. Been travelling with my friend for a couple of days, bit strange being back in the real world to be honest," Amy said, looking about the store as though she had never seen it before.

Lily frowned at the mention of 'real world' finding it rather odd, but shook herself out of it as they had come to where the ties were now.

"Here we go," Lily smiled, gesturing to the bow ties. "Don't really sell that many to be frank, so you don't have that many to choose from. Is your friend nearby?"

"Yeah, should be," Amy said, looking about the store for him. "He was with me a moment ago, but he has a habit of getting distracted, which is strange since he hates it when other people wander off."

"Yeah, I had a mate like that once, always cracked her knuckles, but if she caught you doing it she got right annoyed, said the noise went through her," Lily replied and the two of them chuckled slightly.

"Oh, there he is," Amy said suddenly, perking up. "Oi!"

Lily looked over her shoulder to see who Amy was talk about. It was a man who looked to be slightly older that Amy, with floppy brown hair, a tweed jacket and a bow tie. Lily couldn't help but raise a brow at this strange man with the face of a bloke in his twenties and the clothes of a fifty year old. He was rather attractive though.

"Amy!" the man cheered, clapping his hands together and walking over to them with a goofy grin. "Who's your..." he looked at Lily with wide eyes, making her smile rather confusedly, "…friend" he finished weakly.

"Lily Tyler," she smiled, trying not to look as bewildered as she felt at the man's strange behaviour. "And you are?"

"Er…John. John Smith," he said.

"So…you like bow ties then yeah?" Lily asked, a slow smile appearing on her face as she looked at him.

"Yeah I do. Bow ties are cool," he said, straightening the red bow tie he was currently wearing and Amy rolled her eyes, it seemed he must do that a lot.

"Yeah, I suppose they are. I love them, my granddad used to wear a bow tie," Lily said with a chuckle.

"Aha! You see!" John said, practically beaming and bouncing on the balls of his feet excitedly as he pointed at her. "What did I tell you?" he said to Amy. "Bow ties are cool."

"You missed the bit where she said her _granddad_ wore one," Amy said, rolling her eyes again, but she gave the man a fond smile.

John pouted.

"Lily!" a voice shouted and Lily turned to see Derek giving her a very pointed look from behind the till: she always did get too chatty with customers.

"I guess I better get back to work," Lily said, turning back to the odd couple with a wrinkled nose, not really feeling much motivation to do the mundane work she did every day, she much preferred talking to people.

"Okay then," John said, but he looked rather disappointed.

Lily gave them one last smile and turned to go to the store room, but stopped and turned when John called her name.

"Just wanted to say, I bet you're going to have a great year," John said.

"Yeah?" Lily asked with a grin.

John nodded.

"You're going to be truly brilliant," he said in an extremely earnest voice that made Lily's smile falter slightly, seeing such sadness in his brown eyes, which seemed much too old for his body, but she kept it up and slowly turned to get back to work.

At lunch time Lily went with Rose to the chippy and met Micky at the fountain. Micky was Rose's boyfriend, but he had been Lily's best friend for much longer. She loved how funny Micky could be, and also how kind and caring he could be when you're upset. She had met him at the mechanics. Her mum had been flirting with the boss there, and they had been best friends ever since.

"Come on, give us a kiss," Micky said, trying to give Rose a kiss while his mouth was still full.

Rose shoved his face away in disgust, making Lily and Micky laugh. Micky grabbed some of the chips and wiped them on Rose's nose in retaliation, making her shove him again and wipe her nose.

"Blimey, can't take you anywhere," Lily laughed. "God forbid we'd have to take you to a club or something."

Rose laughed then.

"Yeah right, Micky in a club. I think he'd knock half the people out," she said and Rose and Lily laughed.

"Oi, I've got moves!" Micky said defensively.

"Go on then," Lily said with a slow smile.

"Show us what you've got," Rose added, raising her brows challengingly.

Micky got up and did a weird spin and kick move that had both Lily and Rose laughing loudly as people turned to watch the strange man doing terrible dance moves.

"That is awful!" Rose cried between laughs.

When Lunch was over, Lily gave Micky a hug and Rose gave him a kiss goodbye before they returned to Henricks to continue the rest of the day. Doing the same mundane folding, restocking and helping for another few hours.

At the end of the work day Lily had all but forgotten the odd people she had met earlier and walked with Rose towards the doors to finally go home. However, just as they were about to leave the guard, Jason, beside the doors waved a clear plastic bag filled with money in Rose's face saying "Oi!"

Rose sighed and snatched the bag from him.

"There's no chance I can convince you to go and give this to Wilson is there?" Rose asked.

"No way, it's your turn, I did it last time and Derek did it the time before that," said Lily. "I'll wait by the bus stop for you yeah?"

Rose nodded, grimacing as she turned to head back into the store.

**The Tylers**

Lily waited by the bus stop for quite a while. So long in fact that two buses had come and gone and Rose still hadn't come out of the store. She pulled her phone from her bag to check a time and sighed when she did.

"Oh, come on, Rose," she muttered, looking towards Henricks. She just wanted to go home and have a cup of tea. Working in the shop always tired her out. She had nothing to focus her brain on.

Finally Rose came running out of the shop and Lily's brows furrowed when she saw the distressed look on her face as she nervously looked back at the shop. She was so focused on the shop in fact that when she crossed the road, Lily had to grab the back of her pink hoody and drag her back to stop her from becoming a hood ornament for a black taxi.

"What's wrong?" Lily asked in concern, putting her hands on Rose's cheeks to get her sister to look her in the eyes and stop staring at the dummies in the shop window.

"You wouldn't believe me if I told you," Rose said, wide eyed and breathless.

Lily was about to question her on that when there was an explosion behind her and she jumped, whirling around. She stared at Henricks with wide eyed. A fire ball blasted from the roof and began travelling downwards and shattering the windows in a fiery blast, smoke rising in the air.

"What was that?" Lily demanded. She turned to Rose when she didn't answer. "Rose?"

"Come on," Rose muttered, grabbing Lily's left hand to pull her quickly down the street as everyone else began to panic and run away from the burning building.

It was only then that she noticed the plastic arm in Rose's other hand and she frowned in confusion. What happened back in the store?

**The Tylers**

Lily sat beside Rose on the settee watching the TV. She had tried to get Rose to tell her what had happened back at the stood with the explosion, but she hadn't said anything. It certainly didn't help that their mum was fussing about them and getting calls on the phone from people who were currently watching the news.

"The whole of Central London has been closed off as police investigate the fire. Early reports indicate-" the news anchor was saying.

Their mum entered as Lily began to leaf through a magazine on her lap. She held the phone between her shoulder and her ear as she handed Lily and Rose a cup of tea, before she was able to hold the phone properly since her hands were freed up.

"I know," their mum was saying. "It's on the telly. It's everywhere. They're lucky to be alive. Honestly, it's aged them. skin like an old bible. Walking in now you'd think I was one of their daughters."

Lily looked extremely affronted at that, sharing a look with Rose before rolling her eyes.

She stared down at the magazine on her lap as their mum goes off into the kitchen, still talking on the phone, but she wasn't really reading it. Lily wasn't sure what she was supposed to do now. She had no job. She supposed she could always try to be a social worker or something, but she had looked into that before and she would have to intern for a while before she even got a paying job and a fat lot of good that would be.

Lily only looked up when she heard the door open and she saw Micky rush in, looking worried.

"I've been phoning your mobiles," he said, and Lily pulled her phone out of the bag that was beside her on the settee to see that she did indeed have a few missed calls from Mickey. "You could've been dead. It's on the news and everything. I can't believe your shop went up!"

"Yeah, me neither," Lily said as Micky quickly moved forward to give her a hug.

"We're alright, honestly," Rose said in a rather weary voice and Lily looked at her in concern. Mickey went to give Rose a hug too, but she quickly pushed him away. "I'm fine! Don't make a fuss."

"Well, what happened?" he asked them, sitting down beside them and resting his arm on the back of the settee so that he could look at them both.

"No clue," said Lily with a frown, shaking her head. "One minute we were just standing on the street, next minute-" she made a noise that signified the explosion. "Are you sure you don't know what happened, Rose?" Lily asked her elder sister for the third time and Rose side, rubbing her forehead.

"I don't know," she said rather tiredly, looking as though the explosion was the last thing she wanted to talk about.

"What was it though?" Mickey questioned. "What caused it?"

"We weren't in the shop. We were outside. I didn't see anything," Rose sighed, leaning forward to put her cup of tea on the cluttered coffee table in front of them.

Lily took a sip from her own cup and raised a brow at Rose sceptically. She remembered how Rose had ran out of the shop looking extremely freaked out. Rose was only one year older than Lily, they grew up together, and Lily could tell that Rose was lying. She had seen something. But why would she lie about it? What could have happened to cause that explosion that Rose wouldn't talk about?

Lily huffed in annoyance, slouching back in the settee and glaring at the TV, which was still showing the news report on Henricks. She hated not knowing.

"It's Debbie on the end," their mum said excitedly, rushing into the living room and looking at her two daughters with eager eyes. "she knows a man on the Mirror. Five hundred quid for an interview."

"Oh, that's brilliant! Give it here!" Rose said in a faux eager voice and putting on a fake smile. When mum handed her the phone she hung up and slammed in down onto the coffee table.

Their mum sighed, glaring at Rose ever so slightly and crossing her arms.

"Well, you've got to find some way of making money, your jobs' kaput and I'm not bailing you out," mum pointed out and Lily had to admit that she had a point.

Almost a second later the phone was ringing again and mum picked it up quickly, putting it to her ear.

"Bev!" she exclaimed. "They're alive…I've told them, sue for compensation. They were within seconds of death"

Lily took another sip of tea and watched their mum make her way make into the kitchen, chattering quickly on the phone.

"It really says something when your mum's more popular than you doesn't it?" Lily said dryly, making Rose snort.

Lily and Rose looked up at Mickey when he hopped up to his feet facing them.

"What're you drinking, tea?" he said, plucking the cup from Lily's hands and putting it on the coffee table beside Rose's. "Nah, nah, that's no good, that's no good. You're in shock. You need something stronger" he grabbed Lily's left hand and Rose's right and began to try and pull them up, but they both resisted.

"We're find, Mick, honestly," Lily sighed, pulling her hand from his.

"Now, come on," Micky said, "you deserve proper drinks. We're going down the pub, the three of us. My treat. How about it?"

Lily studied her best friend for a moment before a smile slowly bloomed on her face. She had known Mickey long enough now to know exactly what he was thinking.

"Is there a match on?" Lily said.

"No," Mickey said, in a voice that she guessed he was trying to make offended. "I'm just thinking of you two."

"There's a match on, aint there?" Rose said and she was grinning now too.

Mickey looked like he might deny it again, but after he looked from Rose to Lily and back again, he gave in, putting on a rather eager look at being able to go and watch football.

"If we go we could catch the last five minutes," he said hopefully and Lily and Rose both chuckled lightly at the look on his face.

"Go on then, we're fine," Lily laughed, hitting Mickey on the arm.

"We're fine, really," Rose confirmed when he still looked slightly unsure. "Go. Get rid of that."

Rose gestured over to the plastic arm that she had dumped on the arm chair when they had gotten home. Lily still didn't know where she got it. She couldn't help but wonder why she had bought it home if she was just going to chuck it. Although, she could have still be in a state of shock from the explosion.

Lily shook her head and rubbed her eyes tiredly. She really needed to stop thinking about. It was wearing her out and she would never figure out what had happened unless Rose told her and her sister could be damn stubborn when she wanted to.

"Mm-mmm," Mickey hummed, doing a 'come-hither' gesture with his hand and shooting Rose a teasing smile.

Rose sighed, but there was a smile teasing at the corner of her lips and she leaned forward to give Mickey a kiss. Mickey shoved her back by the shoulder and laughed slightly so when he went to go across the room to get the arm Lily lifted her leg to trip him, but he managed to dodge it, the three of them chuckling.

He grabbed the arm from the armchair and moved to leave.

"Bye, bye," he said in a high voice, waving the arm at them.

"Bye," Lily and Rose said, grinning slightly and shaking their heads when he pretended to be strangled by it as he left.

"Good luck with that in the future," Lily laughed, leaning back to flip through the magazine in her lap again.

"Oh, hey, he's your best friend. You have to put up with him to," Rose said grinning.

"Best friend is not the same as boyfriend at all," Lily challenged, raising her brows and Rose hit her in the shoulder and the pair chuckled.

A moment later Rose's smile faded into that weary look she had been wearing since the explosion and Lily eyed her worriedly. What the hell was going on?

**The Tylers**

The next day Lily was actually able to sleep in for a while before waking up, and get changed into her ripped jeans and grey V-neck with her usual hoody and converse, seeing as she had no job to get to. she was also able to eat a normal breakfast of toast and jam instead of getting rushed out of the house with just a piece of fruit.

Mum was already talking to them about finding a new job and neither Lily or Rose seemed all that thrilled with the idea. She knew that without getting some unpaid training in the psychology field she would just end up with another job exactly like the one in Henricks and it would be the same thing day after day. It just felt like she should be doing…something.

"There's always Finch's," Mum suggested. "You could try them. They've always got jobs"

Lily screwed up her face and shook her head as she took another bite of toast.

"Oh, great. The butchers," Rose said sarcastically, there was a flat expression on her face as she played rolled an apple in her hands.

"Well, it might do you good," Mum said. "That shop was giving you airs and graces. And I'm not joking about compensation. You've had genuine shock and trauma. Arianna got two thousand pounds from the council just because the old man behind the desk said she looked Greek!"

Lily and Rose shared and odd look.

"I know she is Greek, but that's not the point," Mum said, making a smile creep onto the Tyler sister's faces. Their mum was always the same, loving money especially when she could get it while just lounging around in her dressing gown. "It was a valid claim."

Lily finished the last of her toast and moved to the kitchen to dump the plate in the sink, knowing her mum would wash it later.

"Lily, are you going to actually paint the walls today?" Mum called from her bedroom.

"I'm working on it," Lily shouted back, moving into the hallways to frown at the bare wall, which had a few strips of colours that she was considering. "I can't decide on a colour. I'm leaning towards the blue."

"You always choice blue, what about the pink?" Mum said, coming to stand in her bedroom doorway so she could look at the colour choices with her.

Lily rolled her eyes.

"We're not have a pink hallway," she said, leaving no room for argument. "The only reason I tried it out is because you wouldn't shut up about it. If you and Rose had your way the whole flat would be pink"

"Alright, sweetheart," her mum smiled and moved back into her bedroom to drink her tea and get ready.

Lily stood there for a while, tilting her head at different angles as though that would allow her to tell which colour they should use. She had been meaning to paint the walls for weeks, but she just didn't want to paint them only to have to paint them again because the colour was horrid.

"Lily, you are such a liar. I told you to nail that cat flap down. We're going to get strays," Rose called from where she was sitting at the table, before her voice travelled towards the front door.

Lily frowned, affronted at the accusation. She had actually done that. She remembered because she had accidentally imbedded one of the nails in the wall and it took her a hell of a long time to get it back out.

"I did it weeks back!" Lily shouted back.

"No, you thought about it," Rose countered.

"Well, why's it my job to do all the DIY stuff around the house anyway?" Lily said, but she got no reply so went back to trying to decide what colour to decide for the walls.

The red could give it a more homey feel, but at the same time the flat was rather small so a white would be better to make it seem more airy. Then again, white was rather plain and Lily could really she the point in a white wall, it just made it a big block of…nothing.

Lily heard the door open and close and the murmurings of voices. Mum clearly heard it too as she called, "Who is it?" from where she sat in her bedroom putting on her make up.

"It's about last night. He's part of the inquiry. Give us ten minutes," Rose replied and Lily frowned. As far as she knew Rose didn't want anything to do with an inquiry at all.

She turned when Rose came into the hallway, this time with a man. Lily had never seen him before. He had a rather large nose and ears and he was clad in dark clothes and a leather jacket.

"She deserves compensation," mum called from the bedroom when Rose and the man passed by her bedroom door.

"Oh, we're talking millions," the man said with a grin and Lily felt a smile tug at her lips at the obvious sarcasm in his voice that her mum didn't seem to pick up on.

"I'm in my dressing gown," mum said, stranding from her bed and fiddling with the lapel on the pink silk gown.

"Oh, here we go," Lily muttered, rolling her eyes.

"Yes, you are," the man said, seeming completely oblivious as to where her mum was going with that statement, but Lily had heard that tone of her mum's voice too many times to count.

"There's a strongman in my bedroom," mum said in the same voice, stepping forward and fiddling with her dressing gown again.

"Yes there is" the man said.

"Well, anything could happen," Mum said and Lily rolled her eyes, but it quickly turned into a reluctant smile when the man just said "No," and turned away.

"Oh, wait, hang on, you're a stranger," Lily said, grabbing his arm to stop him from being able to carry on to where Rose was in the kitchen.

This could come in useful in deciding which colour. Her mum and Rose were useless when it came to decorating and Micky was even worse. But this man was a strange, he had no reason to be bias at all in choosing a colour for the wall, which made him perfect.

"Yes, right, sorry, I'm the Doctor, hello," the man grinned and Lily couldn't help but smile back. She suddenly recalled that bow tie wearing man from the shop but shook herself out of it.

"Doctor who?" she asked, her brows furrowing in confusion. No one just calls themselves the Doctor. It's always Doctor and then a last name.

"Just…the Doctor," the man shrugged.

Lily eye him in bewilderment for a few moment, screwing her face up before she decided to just let it go. If he was pompous enough to go around calling himself the doctor then it was his own deal.

"I'm Lily," Lily said. "Anyway, which colour?"

"I'm sorry?" the Doctor asked, his brows rising as he crossed his arms over his chest.

Lily pointed over at the lines of paint on the bare wall that she had been staring at.

"The wall, which colour?" she asked again.

He frowned at the wall for a moment before saying, "the blue, definitely"

A grin bloomed on Lily's face.

"Yes! Thank you! I've been thinking that all along, but mum and Rose keep saying pink and then Micky said red, which made me think I needed to choose a different colour since none of them agreed with me, but honesty, who wants a pink hallway?" Lily ranted, laughing slightly. "I'm going to hug you now, so prepare yourself" she warned, pointing a finger at him.

"Okay, I'll hug anyone," the Doctor grinned and Lily quickly pulled him into a hug.

"Do you want a coffee?" Rose's voice called from the kitchen, and the Doctor left Lily's side to go into the living room, which was pretty much connected to the kitchen.

Lily looked at the bare wall for a moment before smiling and going to get the pot of pale blue paint from the cupboard. She went into her bedroom to quickly change into a pair of overalls so she didn't get her clothes covered in paint before crouching down beside the paint pot, trying to open it. she grimaced as she tried to pull the metal lid off the can, but she wasn't able to.

"Ow," she hissed through her teeth as her hand slipped from the lid and looking down at her nails she was relieved to see that none of the turquoise nail polish was chipped.

She frowned at the unopened can of paint, wondering how to proceed.

"Knife," she muttered, standing up.

She walked towards the kitchen to get a knife and could here Rose's voice as she reached the living room, but the Doctor, who she supposed her sister was talking to, didn't seem to be listening. He was shuffling a pack of cards that he had gotten from the side.

"Luck be a lady," he said, but the cards went flying and he added, "maybe not."

"Oi, what d'you think you're doing?" Lily snapped, narrowing her blue eyes as she walked fully into the room.

The Doctor looked at her in surprise, as though he didn't realise he had done anything wrong and then looked down at the mess he had made on the floor.

"Oh, right. Sorry," he told her with a sheepish smile.

Lily sighed and crouched down to begin to collect the cards. If she was being honest she didn't really play with them all that much in the first place. She had only bought them because she had been doing the topic of memory in psychology and she wanted to test her mum, Rose and Mickey for research, she even invited Debby and her little boy, Charlie, around so she could get different ages.

"What's that then? Have you got a cat, Lily?" the Doctor asked as she continued to collect the cards.

"No, not anymore," Lily said, shaking her head even though she wasn't looking at him. "We did have. But he kept bringing strays back to the house with him and mum had enough of it. Not that I was particularly fond of it either, bit strange coming home and finding five cats in the kitchen, none of which were yours"

She was returned the deck of cards to the side when Rose entered, carrying to cups of instant coffee.

"I told Mickey to chuck that out." Rose said, moving some magazines to the side so she could put the cups of coffee down on the coffee table. "You're all the same. Give a man a plastic hand"

It was only then that she noticed the Doctor was pretending to be strangled by the plastic hand just as Mickey had done earlier. Although, she had to admit the Doctor was doing a better job at it, his eyes were wide and panicked and his face was turning red as he made choking noises, if she didn't know any better she'd think the arm was actually trying to kill him.

"Honestly, just like Mickey." Lily said, rolling her eyes. "Then Mickey's only twenty three. What are you, forty? Don't you think you're a little old to be playing with plastic arms?" she asked in amusement, but the Doctor didn't answer, still pretending to be strangled. Lily turned to Rose instead. "Who is he, Rose?"

"I don't know, only met him earlier today, he was in the store just before it went up," said Rose and Lily looked at her in surprise. "I don't even know his name. Doctor, what was it?" she asked the Doctor.

The Doctor got the plastic arm away from his neck, but Lily's eye widen in shock when it froze in mid-air rather than dropping. Maybe the Doctor wasn't pretending then. However, a second later it flew through the air and the hand attached itself to Lily's face. Definitely not pretending then. She fell back against the wall as she tried desperately to pull the thing away from her face, she couldn't breathe!

"Lily!" she heard Rose cry in alarm, but she just continued to try and yank the arm from her face.

Fear spiked through her chest and her stomach clenched. It was trying to kill her. It was actually trying to kill her. A plastic arm…was trying to kill her. It was alive, and attacking her. She continued to yank at it, but it was ridiculously strong.

She felt the presence of Rose and the Doctor in front of her and tried to help her yank the thing from her face, but even with the combined effort of the three of them they weren't able to do it.

"What do we do?!" Rose shouted, holding onto Lily's shoulder as she yanked on the arm.

Lily felt her lungs began to burn from lack of oxygen and she tried even harder to pull the thing off of herself. suddenly, there was an odd whirring noise and the hand was removed. Lily blinked at the sudden ability to see again and gulped in air quickly, her heart pounding as the panic hadn't quite left her yet.

"Lils, are you okay?" Rose asked in concern, wrapping an arm around her little sister.

Lily only nodded in response, still trying to get her breathe back. She didn't look at Rose either, her eyes were trained on the Doctor. The whirring sound appeared to be coming from a strange metal stick with a glowing blue tip in his hand. He was holding the plastic arm, which was still moving, and pointing the odd object at it. He jabbed the device into the plastic palm and quite suddenly the fingers stopped flexing, and the arm looked as though it had never even moved in the first place.

"It's all right. I've stopped it," the Doctor said, talking as though nothing remotely strange had even happened. He through the arm in their direction and Rose caught it. "There you go, you see? Armless" he quipped.

"Do you think?" Rose asked, staring at him incredulously and she hit him rather hard with the plastic arm in the shoulder.

"Ow!" The Doctor cried, looking at Rose in shock and rubbing his shoulder.

**The Tylers**

"Hang on!" Lily shouted as she and Rose chased after the Doctor down the many stairs from their flat. Shortly after Rose had hit him, he just left. Not even a goodbye or an explanation, he just left as though nothing had even happened.

"Hold on a minute," Rose tried as the Doctor didn't stop. "You can't just go swanning off."

"Yes I can," the Doctor disagreed. "Here I am. This is me, swanning off. See you," he said, waving the plastic arm at them in some semblance of a goodbye.

"B-but that arm was alive!" Lily cried, stuttering slightly in confusion as she eyed the unmoving arm in the Doctor's hand cautiously. "It's just plastic and it was moving. It tried to kill me…and you!"

"Ten out of ten for observation," the Doctor said, still continuing down the stairs.

Lily and Rose shared a look before they both glared at this strange, confusing man. He knew more than he was letting on, that was for sure. He managed to stop that arm, meaning he knew exactly what it was. She just couldn't understand why he wasn't telling anyone, especially them who had been there. Surely it would make more sense to get help? The police or the fire department, something.

"You can't just walk away. That's not fair," Rose said, as the two Tyler sisters followed him. "You've got to tell us what's going on"

"No, I don't," the Doctor said as the three of them exited the stairwell to the Powell Estate outside the block of flats.

"All right, then. I'll go to the police. I'll tell everyone. You said, if I did that, I'd get people killed. So, your choice. Tell us, or I'll start talking," Rose said in a faux flippant choice as the three of them walked down the street.

Lily looked at her in surprise. So, this had happened before? It had happened before and Rose and the Doctor had been there. She suddenly recalled how Rose had come running from the shop with the plastic arm, a look of panic on her face just before it blew up. That must have been when it happened. A little bit of hurt appeared in her eyes now. Rose hadn't even told her. She thought they told each other everything, but Rose had kept something this big from her.

Rose clearly caught the hurt look on her face as she sent her an apologetic look.

"Is that supposed to sound tough?" the Doctor asked, looking at Rose and not seeming in the least bit intimidating.

"…Sort of," Rose shrugged.

"Doesn't work," the Doctor retorted quickly and continued walking, a smile on his face.

"Who are you?" Lily asked, narrowing her eyes.

This man with his easy confidence, his knowledge in things that didn't even seem like they should exist and his eyes, eyes that were older than they had the right to be. Who was he?

"Told you. The Doctor," he said, not giving anything away and not lessening Lily's suspicion and curiosity of him in the slightest.

"Yeah, but Doctor what?" Rose asked, sounding rather exasperated.

"Just, the Doctor," the Doctor said, just as he had done when Lily had asked the question back at the flat.

"The Doctor," Rose repeated flatly, not looking in the least bit amused with his short answers and she and Lily shared a rather annoyed look.

"Is that supposed to sound impressive?" Rose huffed.

"Sort of," the Doctor said, just as Rose had.

"Come on then," Lily and Rose said together, the pair of them skipping forward so they were able to walk on either side of the Doctor rather than running after him.

"You can tell us. That arms attacked me, and clearly something attacked Rose. We've seen it now, if you can't tell us, who can you tell?" Lily tried to reason.

"We've seen enough," Rose agreed. "Are you the police?"

"No, I was just passing through. I'm a long way from home," the Doctor said.

Lily frowned, eyeing him. The way he said that wasn't as though he was just talking about come up from Manchester or something.

"Where's your home?" she asked curiously.

"A long way away," the Doctor countered, but Lily didn't miss the look that flittered into his eyes, although it was gone too soon for her to identify what it was.

"Right, of course," Lily said sarcastically, rolling her eyes.

"But what have we done wrong?" asked Rose. "How come those plastic things came after us?"

"Oh! Suddenly the entire world revolves around you," The Doctor cried sardonically. "You two were just accidents. You got in the way, that's all."

That made Lily rather worried. Wilson was dead, the police report on the telly said so. He was a nice bloke and Lily had chatted to him now and again when it was her turn to take the lottery money, was he just 'in the way' too? Is that was this…plastic thing…did to people in the way, kill them? Worry was building in the pit of her stomach. Whatever this thing was it was dangerous, and clearly this man that called himself the Doctor was smack bang in the middle of it.

"It tried to kill us!" Rose challenged, sounding rather incredulous as the two blondes eyed the Doctor.

"It was after me, not you two," The Doctor said. "Last night, in the shop, I was there, you blundered in, almost ruined the whole thing. This morning, I was tracking it down, it was tracking me down. The only reason it fixed on you and Lily is 'cos you met me."

"_It was tracking you_, but it's plastic, how can plastic track someone?" Lily cried. She hated not understanding things. It was one of the reasons she wanted to be a psychiatrist. This whole thing was just one big mass confusion and Lily hated it.

The Doctor looked about to reply with his usual vague response, but Rose cut in incredulously saying, "so what you're saying is, the entire world revolves around you?"

"Sort of, yeah," the Doctor said with his usual grin.

Lily's brows rose in surprise and she shared a look with Rose, before they both looked back at the Doctor.

"You're so full of it," Lily laughed and Rose grinned in agreement.

"Sort of, yeah," the Doctor said again, his grin widening and giving a small laugh.

"But…all this plastic stuff," Rose said, getting them back in track and Lily's grin faded as she looked at the Doctor for any signs of answers on his face. "Who else knows about it?"

"No one," the Doctor said shortly.

"So you're doing this on your own?" Lily asked with a frown. "No help whatsoever, you're just going to go in there and stop…whatever this is…and what? Hope for the best?"

"Pretty much," the Doctor shrugged, shooting her another grin. "Besides, who else is there? I mean, you lot, all you do is eat chips, go to bed, and watch telly, while all the time, underneath you, there's a war going on."

Lily felt rather offended by his offhanded insult, even though she could readily admit that it was true. Something else about what he had said caught her attention though. 'You lot'. He said that as though he wasn't the same. Did he mean he wasn't the same because he actually noticed all the strange happening around them or did he mean…something else?

Rose reached around the Doctor and took the plastic arm from him, getting his attention.

"Okay, start from the beginning," Rose said. "if we're going to go with the living plastic, and I don't even believe that, but if we do, how did you kill it?"

Lily looked at the Doctor curiously, awaiting the answer. She hadn't even thought of that. She was so busy worrying about the fact that whatever was going on was so clearly dangerous to even spend time wondering about how the Doctor had managed to get the arm to stop moving.

"The thing controlling it projects life into the arm. I cut off the signal, dead," the Doctor said.

Both Lily's and Rose's brows furrowed as they thought about this and they frowned.

"So, this thing that's controlling it, it's sending out a signal to…all the plastic I suppose…with what? Radio control? To do what?"

"Thought control," the Doctor corrected.

Lily's face screwed up in thought at that. There was something out there that could control thoughts. Was it just plastic, or could it actively control a person to? although, thinking of that, where did it even come from? There's something out there that can send a signal to plastic to get it to kill someone, there's no way it was from earth. Was it extra-terrestrial? What did it even want? What was the purpose of what it was doing?

"Are you okay?" he asked, looking at the overwhelmed look on the two girls' faces.

"Yeah," Lily and Rose said, shaking their heads.

"So, who's controlling it, then?" Rose asked.

"Long story," the Doctor replied shortly.

"What's it all for? I mean, shop window dummies, what's that about?" Rose asked, sounding rather amused now. "Is someone trying to take over Britain's shops?" she asked mockingly.

A grin formed on Lily's face and the three of them laughed. Her chest felt lighter at the joking, able to not worry about being killed by something plastic that was being controlled by something else that was a 'long story.'

"No," the Doctor said as the three of them continued to chuckle.

"Oh, no." Lily grinned.

"It's not a price war," the Doctor said and the three of them laughed some more. Suddenly the Doctor smile vanished and he said seriously, "they want to overthrow the human race and destroy you. Do you believe me?"

"No," Rose said, looking at him like he was insane.

"What about you?" he asked, turning to Lily. "Do you believe me?"

Lily bit her lip, staring up into his face. She couldn't detect any sign of lie on his face, but this couldn't be real, could it? Plastic that's trying to destroy everyone? It couldn't be real. It just couldn't. Because that would mean that there's danger, actual proper danger, and that scared her.

"I don't want to," Lily said softly and the Doctor nodded.

"But you're both still listening," he said to the Tyler sisters.

Lily and Rose stopped then, sharing a look as the Doctor continued to walk.

"Really though, Doctor," Rose said, as the pair of them watched his back. "Tell us, who are you?"

The question finally got the Doctor to stop and he turned slightly. Looking at the two of them for a moment, the Doctor considered the question before his lips turned up into a small smile.

"Do you know like we were saying about the earth revolving?" he said, and Lily and Rose looked at him in confusion, wondering what that had to do with who he was. He turned fully now and walked back to stand in front of them. "It's like when you were kids. The first time they tell you the world's turning and you just can't quite believe it because everything looks like it's standing still. I can feel it."

He turned to stand in between them and grab their hands in his.

"The turn of Earth. The ground beneath our feet is spinning at a thousand miles an hour, and the entire planet is hurtling round the sun at sixty seven miles an hour, and I can feel it. we're falling through space, you and me, clinging to the skin of this tiny little world, and if we let go." He released their hands and faced them again. "That's who I am. Now, forget me, Rose and Lily Tyler. Go home."

The Doctor took the plastic arm from Rose and left then, walking across the street towards a blue police box without looking back, but Lily and Rose stared after him. Lily was fascinated by his words, they seemed to seep into her so that she could almost begin to experience what he was saying. He was strange, but Lily was absolutely fascinated by this 'Doctor.' She still had no clue who he was, but at the same time she reckoned no one ever truly did.

"That was enigmatic," Lily breathed, trying to relieve the tension.

Rose looked at her then, her lips tilting up into a small smile and the pair of them laughed slightly.

"Come on," Rose said, grabbing Lily's hand and they turned to walk back home, just as he said, but Lily doubted they would ever forget him.

They were half way up the street when they felt a sudden wind through their hair and heard a strange wheezing sound. Lily and Rose both turned, listening carefully to where the noise was coming from. It sounded as though it was where they had been talking to the Doctor only moments before. The sisters shared a glance before running down the street towards the noise.

They stopped when they got back to where they once were and looked up and down the street. The wheezing sound had gone now…but so had the Doctor and the police box.

**The Tylers**

When they got back to the flat, Lily and Rose both tried everything to keep their minds off of the Doctor and living plastic and the strange blue box. Lily actually managed to paint all of the walls in the pale blue and even give I a second coat. Rose had tidied her bedroom, and then Lily's bedroom and even the rest of the flat. Their mum was utterly bewildered by their actions, seeing as they usually just lazed around.

However, when the painting was done and Lily pulled her normal clothes back on, there was nothing left in the flat to do other than watch telly, and it didn't distract either of them at all. In the end Lily decided to go to Mickey's and Rose decided to come along, but based on the way her eyes lit up Lily expected she had an ulterior motive for wanting to go.

"Hey, hey, here's my woman. Kit off!" Mickey said as he opened the door in just a top and a pair of lime green boxers, smacking Rose's behind as she walked through the door.

"Best friend and sister, right here," Lily grimaced as she followed Rose inside and shoved Mickey when he just grinned at her.

Rose kissed Mickey in greeting.

"Coffee?" he asked.

"Yeah, only if you wash the mug," Rose said, as they walked into the flat, "and I don't mean rinse, I mean wash," she said smiling, before she tapped him on the shoulder. "Can I use your computer?"

And there it was. The ulterior motive. Lily shook her head. Rose was going to look up this Doctor person, she just knew it. Lily was intrigued too, but she also knew not to trust everything she read on the internet. If they wanted to find out more about the Doctor, the best thing to do would be to just wait to see him again.

"Yeah. Any excuse to get in the bedroom," Mickey teased as Rose went to the bedroom and Lily followed him into the kitchen. Mickey grabbed a mug from the side and began to run the water to wash it. "Don't read my emails!" he shouted.

Lily looked about the kitchen and grimaced. There were dirty dishes and packaging on the side, dirty tea towels and half eaten food. It was more of a mess than it had been in a while. Lily began to pile up the dirty dishes and cups and then pulled the bin over to dispose of the wrappers and take-away packaging.

"You are such a mother," Mickey laughed, and Lily turned to see him looking at her in amusement as he washed the cup.

"What do you mean?" she asked as she shoved sum more trash into the bin.

Mickey raised his brows and nodded towards her hand. It was only then that she noticed what she was doing, how she was fussing and cleaning the room and she quickly straightened out.

"I was not – oh just shut up," Lily said when she found no defence and threw a dish towel at him as the two of them began to laugh.

**The Tylers**

Rose filled Lily and Mickey in on what she found on the computer when she asked Mickey if he would drive her to a man's, Clive's, house. Apparently there was a picture of the Doctor and Clive had been looking into him for quite a while.

"Mickey and I should come with you. This is a strange man on the internet, who has been all but stalking the Doctor, how could this sound like a good idea?" Lily asked incredulously, as she leaned forward from her spot in the back of Mickey's yellow car and propping her elbows on the front seats.

"You're not coming in," Rose said again. "He's safe. He's got a wife and kids"

"Yeah, who told you that? He did," Mickey said and Lily pointed at him, giving Rose an 'I told you' look. "That's exactly what an internet lunatic murder would say."

Rose gave the pair of them a vaguely annoyed look before she shook her head and got out of the car. She knocked on the window as a goodbye and walked towards the house. Lily huffed in annoyance and climbed, cat-like, from the back seat and into the passenger side where Rose just left.

Lily and Mickey both watched her go with narrowed eyes, not taking their eyes off of her. They watched as she knocked on the door of the house and readied themselves to jump into action if anything happened to her, half suspecting 'Clive' was going to jump out a grab her as soon as he opened the door.

However, it was a young boy who opened the door and Lily relaxed slightly, seeing that he at least wasn't lying about having kids, but Mickey didn't relax in the slightest, stilling staring with narrowed, suspicious eyes.

Rose said something to the boy, who shouted into the house. A moment later a man comes to the door. He had dark hair and he was overweight, although at the distance Lily had to reluctantly admit that he had a kind face, but you couldn't trust that these days.

Rose talked to the man for a moment before she pointed over to Mickey and Lily in the car. The two of them both sat up straight and tried to look intimidating, showing that he shouldn't try anything, but Lily had to admit they were rather bad at it. Clive gave them a cheery wave before he and Rose disappeared in the house.

"He…didn't look too bad," Lily said slowly, slouching back in her seat.

Mickey huffed and straightened his coat as he too leaned back in his seat. "Yeah, well, I bet people sat that about Hitler before he went and murdered them," Mickey countered.

"I really doubt they did," Lily said, her face screwing up at the thought.

Lily and Mickey were silent for a moment, just watching the closed door of the house, but Rose didn't emerge kicking and screaming so they both relaxed.

"I can't believe you've got a car and I don't," Lily sighed after a while, looking about the little car.

"That's because I worked hard, I earned this car," Mickey said with a grin, patting the steering wheel.

Lily let out a laugh at that.

"I've been your best friend for years, Mick, I know exactly how hard working you are," she said with a grin and Mickey gave her a rather affronted look, which did nothing to dial down her amusement.

Mickey looked about to answer when he turned to look through the windshield with narrowed eyes and a frown.

"Did you see that?" he asked.

Lily looked through the window too, looking at the empty street in confusion. She didn't see anything at all that could warrant that expression from Mickey.

"See what?" she asked in bewilderment.

"That," he said, pointing a finger and Lily raised her brows as she followed it.

"You mean the bin?" she said incredulously.

"It moved," he replied.

Lily looked at him as though he was insane before looking back at the bin. It showed no side at all that it had moved at all. She was about to point this out to Mickey, when the bin did in fact wheel forward slightly.

"Is something pushing it?" Mickey said, opening the car door to get out and check.

Lily eyed the bin anxiously, but got out to follow Mickey. The two of them walked forward and got on either side of the bin, which had stopped moving again, and looked around to see if anything was behind it, but there wasn't.

Lily shared a look with Mickey and they both moved to stand in front of it. Lily inched forward, but Mickey put out an arm to keep her behind him. She gave him a confused, questioning look.

"Maybe there's something inside it," he whispered and Lily nodded in understanding.

Her reached out his hands, wiggling his fingers as though to prepare himself and put them down on the lid.

"Come on, then," he said as he opened the bin, but there was nothing inside of it.

Lily and Mickey shared another look before Lily's eyes widened.

Plastic. The bin was made of plastic. Maybe it wasn't just dummies that could be controlled, but all plastic. In that case there wasn't something pushing the bin. It was moving all on its own and it was dangerous.

"Mickey, I think we better just leave it," Lily said, trying to stop the worry from seeping into her voice.

Mickey looked at her, but nodded and shut the bin. Lily turned to go back to the car, but stopped when Mickey wasn't following.

"Come on," she said, nodding towards the car.

"I'm stuck," he replied, pulling on his hands, but he didn't seem to be able to get them off the lid.

Lily rushed forward and tugged on his arms too, as hard as she could. The plastic beneath his palm stretched, but it didn't let him go. Lily felt fear twist once more in her stomach. First an arm and now a bin. Was a bin going to kill them? Was that how it was going to end, death by bin?

"Pull harder," Lily said, wrapping her arms around Mickey's waist.

They both heaved and began to step backwards, pulling as hard as they could. Lily looked over Mickey's shoulder and saw that the stretched plastic of the bin lid still wasn't letting him go. The bin was now making an almost growling noise and Lily bit her lip, her face screwing up in worry as she tightened her hold on Mickey.

However, it didn't help. The plastic suddenly pulled on Mickey, yanking both him and Lily forward. They let out startled yells as they flew forward and disappeared into the bin.

A few moments later, Rose left Clive's house and went back to the yellow car, shaking her head as she did.

"All right, he's a nutter. Off his head. Complete online conspiracy freak. You win!" she said as she opened the car door and got back in the passenger seat.

Mickey was still sitting in front of the wheel but she turned with furrowed brows when she saw that Lily was no longer in the back seat.

"Where's Lily?" she asked, but Mickey didn't answer and didn't look at all worried. "Did she leave while I was in there? I swear she has no patience." She shook her head and sighed. "So, what are we going to do tonight? I fancy a pizza."

"Pizza!" Mickey repeated. "P-p-pizza!"

"Or Chinese," Rose suggested thoughtfully.

"Pizza!" Mickey was all Mickey said, and he began to drive, swerving down the road.

**The Tylers**

"-ily, wake up! Lily!" she heard Mickey's voice calling.

Lily groaned and rolled over on the uncomfortable metal grate of a floor she was lying on. Her head was pounding painfully. She grimaced and slowly opened her eyes, pushing herself upwards slowly to sit up, her muscles tired and aching.

"Lily, thank god," Mickey gasped, pulling her into a tight hug, which Lily responded to in confusion.

Her brows were furrowed and she was biting her lip as she rested her chin on Mickey's shoulder. How did they get…wherever they were? The last thing she remembered was-

Abruptly, she pulled from Mickey's hug and jumped to her feet. Looking around wildly. A bin. They were eaten…by a bin. They were in some sort of multi-level chamber. It was extremely warm where they were and the place seemed to have an eerie red glow about it. Chains were hanging from the walls and ceilings. She looked over the railing of the level they were on and saw a huge vat of a weird liquid, which smelt strongly of melting plastic, and it was moving about as though being turned, but from where she stood she could see nothing turning it.

"Where are we? Is there a way out?" she asked Mickey.

"I-I don't know," he stuttered fearfully, still sitting down on the floor, resting beside a crate and not looking like he was going to move at all.

Lily looked around again, at all the layers and searching for a way out. Then she saw it, there was a door.

"Come on, there's a door, get up!" Lily snapped, grabbing Mickey's arm and pulling him to his feet.

She dragged Mickey, who had a fearful look on his face, up different metal stairs before they finally got to the metal door, which she pulled open. They were just in another, much smaller room, but there was a ladder at the end.

"We're underground," Lily muttered to herself.

Moving forward, she climbed the ladder and began to push at the manhole above her, but it didn't budge.

"Mickey, come help me," she said, looking down, but Mickey barely even responded, still looking extremely scared. "Oh, fat lot of good you are." She tried to push on the manhole again, but it still wouldn't move. "It has to be opened from the outside," she said as she descended back down the ladders and ran a hand through her hair.

"Come on," Lily said, grabbing Mickey's arm again and pulling him back through the door.

"No, no I'm not going back down there," Mickey said, shaking his head as she tried to get him to go back down the stairs. "That-that liquid is too weird," he said, pointing toward the vat.

Lily eyed the liquid too, feeling rather anxious about it. Her heart was beating wildly and fear was twisting in her stomach at being trapped down here, but she was trying to act as calm as she could, for her sake and for Mickey's. They would never find a way out of here if she went as catatonic as Mickey was right now.

"Look," she said to Mickey, putting her hands on his cheeks to get him to face her. "Whatever that…bin…did to us, it put us down there. That must mean there is a way in somewhere around there. So, that's where we need to be, okay?"

Mickey looked at her with wide eyes, but gave a hurried nod. She led him back down to the level they were on and once she stopped Mickey sat back down in his old position, wrapping his arms around his legs as though trying to look as small as possible. Lily on the other hand, stayed standing. She put her hands on the railing again and stared down at the metal vat of strange molten red/orange liquid. It let out a roaring noise and moved again.

"Does that liquid smell like plastic to you?" Lily asked, but Mickey didn't reply, just continuing to hold himself. "And it's like its…alive" Mickey whimpered at what she said.

She remembered what the Doctor said about something else controlling all the plastic. Was this it? Was what was in this great big vat, the creature that was intent on destroying all the human race? Lily stepped away from the railing, eyeing the vat with fear, before she looked towards the stairs which led to a level directly above it. Making a snap decision she went to move towards the stairs, but was suddenly held back by Mickey wrapping his arms around her waist and pressing her cheek against her stomach.

"Don't leave…whatever that thing is, it's not good," Mickey said, his voice shaking.

"I'm not leaving, I'm just going to…get a closer look," she replied, she pried Mickey off of her and he went back into his earlier position and she made her way down the stairs to stands on the level above the vat.

The level had no railing at the end of it, only on the side, so Lily stepped forward cautiously to stand as close to the edge as she dared, never taking her scared eyes off of the moving liquid.

"H-hello," Lily stuttered, not even sure if this was a creature that could even speak or if it even was the creature and she as going to be just making a fool of herself by taking to harmless liquid. "I-I'm Lily Tyler…a-and y-you are?"

The liquid made a roaring sound and it moved in such a way so that the shape of it vaguely resembled a face.

"_I am the Nestene Consciousness"_

Lily jumped slightly, her fear spiking and her heart skipping a beat. The liquid, Nestene Consciousness, didn't make a sound other than the odd roaring. The voice was in her head. It was then that she recalled the Doctor saying it was thought control, so she supposed it stood to some insane logic that it would communicate in thoughts.

"O-okay," Lily said fearfully, daring to take one more slow step forward. "Y-you've b-been controlling the p-plastic. W-why?" she asked.

"_Earth is full of smoke and oil, with a lot toxins and dioxins for me to eat. My food source was lost in the war, my world was lost"_ The Nestene Consciousness said.

"W-what war?" said Lily.

"_The Time War"_

"O-okay, so, you need somewhere to stay, you need food," Lily said, nodding in understanding, glad to at least get some small explanation. "But you've tried to kill people"

"_My world was lost"_ the Nestene Consciousness repeated.

"Yes, you've said, but why try to kill people?" Lily asked.

"_My world was lost"_ was all it said again.

"Yes, but – oh," she breathed in realisation and she backed up a few steps. "Your world was lost, so you're going to take this one….but you can't! Billions of people live here, you can't just kill them!" she cried in alarm.

The Nestene Consciousness flexed and roared, but Lily didn't hear what it said in her mind, but she did hear something behind her. She turned in alarm and saw a shop dummy was behind her. She opened her mouth, but before she could yell or say anything the dummy bought down its hand and knocked her out.

**The Tylers**

When Lily awoke for the second time, it was once again a voice that awoke her, but this time it wasn't Mickey.

"Lily! Wake up! Please, wake up!" Rose cried, slapping Lily's cheek.

Lily groaned, forcing her eyes open and sitting up. She hissed and pain and put her hand to the side of her head, where a painful bump resided.

"My head," Lily moaned in pain.

"Oh, you're okay, I thought you and Mickey were dead," Rose cried, pulling her into a tight hug, which Lily didn't respond to, not quite having her bearings after having been knocked out.

When Rose pulled away, Lily looked around in confusion. She was once again on the level she arrived on and Mickey was still sitting and hugging his legs to his chest in fear.

"That thing down there, the liquid. Rose, it can talk!" Mickey cried pointing towards the Nestene Consciousness.

"You're stinking," Rose said. "Doctor, they kept them alive!"

Lily jumped to her feet and turned quickly. She hadn't realised anyone else was here, but the Doctor was coming down the stairs to the level they were at.

"Yeah, that was always a possibility," The Doctor said.

"You knew that and you never said?" Rose cried angrily, glaring harshly at the Doctor as she put an arm around a shaking Mickey.

"Can we keep the Domestics outside, thank you?" The Doctor said, not looking in the least bit effected by Rose's anger at him.

He was about to go down the stairs and Lily quickly followed, Rose and Mickey doing the same soon after her. She realised quite quickly where they were going, the Doctor wanted to speak to the Nestene Consciousness, just as she had.

"No, but Mickey's right, the Nestene Consciousness, it talks!" Lily cried, as they reached another level, just one level away from the bottom one, which was above the vat.

The Doctor actually stopped then, turning to look at her in surprise.

"How do you know it was the Nestene Consciousness?" he asked suspiciously, stepping to stand right in front of her. "You're not made of plastic are you?" he asked, knocking on her head. "Nope, bonehead, just like your sister," he said with a frown. "So how did you know?"

"I-it told me," Lily said, her brows furrowed as she shook her head. "The man-hold wouldn't open from the inside, so I talked to it. it's food and planet is lost, so it wants this one. I told it that it can't just kill the entire human race and it got a dummy to knock me out"

The Doctor looked at her blankly for a moment before a grin split across his face.

"You are brilliant!" he cried. "A human actually talking to the Nestene Consciousness and figuring out what was happening. Absolutely brilliant!"

"Urm…thanks?" Lily said, blushing slightly despite the frown on her face as she looked at the Doctor in bewilderment.

The Doctor didn't say anything else, just gave her another appreciative grin and turning to hurry down the last set of metal stares. Lily shared a look with Rose, who was being clung to by Mickey, and they quickly moved towards the railings so they could watch the Doctor converse with it.

"Am I addressing the consciousness?" the Doctor asked and the vat flexed, making a roaring sound that Lily knew meant it must be talking inside the Doctor's head. "Thank you. If I might observe, you infiltrated this civilisation by means of warp shunt technology. So, may I suggest, with the greatest respect that you shunt off?" the Doctor quipped, grinning.

The Nestene Consciousness twisted in the vat and once again made itself in a vague resemblance of a face and roared again, not seeming happy by the Doctor's suggestion.

"That doesn't speak English…how did you talk to it?" Rose whispered to Lily in confusion.

"Remember what the Doctor said about it having thought control?" Lily asked quietly and Rose nodded with furrowed brows. "Well, it sort of talks…but in your head"

Rose screwed up her face, not looking at all pleased with that before they turned back to watch the Doctor.

"Oh, don't give me that. It's an invasion, plain and simple. Don't talk about constitutional rights" the Doctor said and the Nestene Consciousness flexed and roared again. "I AM TALKING! This planet it just starting. These stupid little people have only just learned how to walk, but they're capable of so much more."

"What's he talking about?" Lily hissed to Rose in confusion as to how he said 'people.'

"He's an alien," Rose replied.

"Okay," Lily breathed, realising she probably should have suspected that would be the answer and turned back to watch the scene in front of them, although she didn't spare a look of worry in the Doctor's direction.

"I'm asking you on their behalf," the Doctor said. "Please, just go."

Lily turned when a she saw movement and saw that just as they had done to her, two shop dummies suddenly walked from behind the Doctor.

"Doctor!" Rose shouted in warning.

The Doctor was about to turn, but before he could do anything one of the dummies grabbed him by the arms, while another one reached into his leather jacket. The Doctor struggled, but wasn't able to get away and the second dummy pulled a vial of strange blue liquid from his jacket.

The Nestene Consciousness roared angrily at the appearance of the liquid.

"That was just insurance. I wasn't going to use it," the Doctor said.

"What's that?" Lily asked Rose.

"Anti-plastic," Rose replied.

Lily didn't have a clue what that was but based on the name she was going to say that it meant nothing good for the Nestene Consciousness. The thing in question let out another roar as it twisted and turned in its vat.

"I was not attacking you. I'm here to help. I'm not your enemy. I swear I'm not," the Doctor said imploringly and the Nestene Consciousness responded, which caused his eyes to widen. "what do you mean?"

Lily looked up when she saw a door that she hadn't even notice before slide open and reveal the blue police box that had disappeared with the Doctor earlier in the day. Lily frowned when she saw Rose's expression to the Box's appearance. What importance did a police box have?

"No. Oh, no. Honestly, no," the Doctor said, and the Nestene Consciousness spoke again. "Yes, that's my ship."

Lily's eyes widened and she looked up at the blue box again. That was his ship? The Doctor's ship? It was just a little blue box. How could just a thing possibly be a ship, it was rather small. She sent a questioning look at Rose who just nodded in response to the silent question.

The Nestene Consciousness rumbled and flexed again.

"That's not true. I should know, I was there. I fought in the war. It wasn't my fault. I couldn't save your world! I couldn't save any of them!" the Doctor cried, a look of immense anguish on his face.

Lily looked at him. Looked at that complete look of anguish and pain and loss on his face and thought about his words. The Nestene Consciousness said that it's world was lost in the time war. If the Doctor had fought in it, had fought and couldn't save any of the worlds, what of his own home? Had his own planet be lost, just like the Nestene Consciousness'?

"What's it doing?" Rose called.

"It's the TARDIS! The Nestene's identified It as superior technology. It's terrified. It's going to the final phase. It's starting the invasion. Get out, Rose! Just leg it now!"

The Nestene Consciousness kept roaring as the Doctor continued to struggle with the shop dummy, which showed no sign of letting him go any time in the future.

Lily and Rose shared a wide-eyed look. If the invasion was starting that meant everyone was in danger…including their mum.

Lily grabbed her phone and quickly dialled the familiar number.

"Mum?" she asked when the phone was answered.

"Oh, there you are," mum replied. "I was just going to phone. You and Rose can get compensation. I said so. I've got this document thing off the police. Don't thank me"

"No, mum, that doesn't – where are you?" Lily asked quickly.

"I'm in town," she said.

Lily's eyes widened and Rose must have guessed what her mum had said as she quickly grabbed Lily's phone from her and held it to her own ear.

"Mum, go home!" she shouted. "Go home right now!"

Rose listened as their mum replied as Lily watched her sister anxiously, Micky clinging to her.

"Mum! Mum!" Rose shouted in distress. "She hung up," Rose said, handing the phone back to Lily.

"But she can't be out there!" Lily shouted, biting her lip and feeling her heart banging fiercely against her ribs in fear of what could happen to her mum.

Lily whirled around and let out a starlet lamp as the Consciousness started throwing angry bolts around. It looked light lightning, emerging from the vat and shooting upwards, which caused a small explosion above them.

"It's the activation signal. It's transmitting!" the Doctor shouted up to them.

"It's the end of the world," Rose said.

Lily put a hand over her mouth as she let out a small sob, a tear escaping her eye as she watched the bolt of lightning energy and put her other hand on Mickey's shoulder. The energy surge suddenly stopped and Lily could only guess that it was nothing good. The transmission had clearly been sent.

The Nestene in the vat was getting extremely agitated, thrashing around wildly.

"Get out, Rose! Just get out! Run!" the Doctor yelled as he struggled with the dummy.

They looked up just in time to see the pieces of metal that had previously made up the stairs crumble and fall to the ground.

"The stairs of gone," Rose cried.

Lily and Rose looked down to see that the dummies holding the Doctor were now trying to push him into the vat. Rose grabbed Lily's hand, who in turn grabbed Mickey's, and pulled her towards the blue box, the TARDIS. Rose pulled on the handle, but the TARDIS didn't answer.

"I haven't got the key!" Rose exclaimed, banging on the door.

"We're gonna die!" Mickey cried.

"Thanks for the optimism, Mickey," Lily snapped, pulling at the TARDIS doors again, but they still didn't open. They were locked.

Mickey cowered against Lily, who put an arm around her best friend, leaning against the TARDIS in fear as more tears slipped out her eyes. Mickey had been right. They were going to die. Everyone was going to die.

Lily looked around for any possibilities to stop what was happening, but there was no way out, no way up without the stairs and no more doors. She looked down and saw the Doctor thrashing against the dummy holding him, looked at Mickey cowering at her side. Before she looked at Rose, who had an arm wrapped around her shoulders, and her lip trembled as fear worked its way through her system, so much so that she could barely breathe.

Rose took a step forward, and Lily looked at her with wide eyes. Wondering what her sister had seen that she hadn't. the Doctor and Mickey looked up at her too, with completely different expressions.

"Just leave him! There's nothing you can do!" Mickey shouted to Rose and Lily looked at him in shock, never expecting her best friend to say something like that. She knew he was a bit of a coward, had seen as much when she and Rose forced him to watch horror movies, but to leave someone to die?

"Stay here!" Rose told Lily sternly, before she ran off.

Lily held tightly onto Mickey and the two of them stare after Rose. She grabbed an axe from the wall and raised it above her head.

"I've got no A levels, no job, no future," she said and began to chop through the rope that was holding a very long chain to the wall. "But I'll tell you what I have got," she continued, grabbing a firm hold of the rope. "Jericho Street Junior School under 7's gymnastic team. I got the bronze!"

Lily watched anxiously as Rose took a running start and swung out along the side of the catwalk, down to where the Doctor was. She kicked the two dummies beside the Doctor into the Vat. The golden Nestene began letting out screams and Lily frowned when she saw it was turning blue. The vial! The second dummy was holding anti-plastic and it had clearly gone in with it!

"Rose!" The Doctor shouted, grabbing her to stop her from swinging back, and she landed on beside him, letting go of the rope.

"Now we're in trouble," the Doctor said, and just as he did there was a huge explosion overhead.

The Doctor and Rose began to run and Lily left Mickey, clutching at the TARDIS in fear, to run over to the stairwell and grab Rose's hand to help her run faster. The Doctor pulled a key from inside his leather jacket and leaned over Mickey to unlock the door.

"Will we all…" Lily started as they went into the box before he eyes widened when Rose came in behind her and shut the door "…fit."

The inside was massive. The walls were slightly curved and covered in brass coloured hexagons and there were coral like columns situated around the edge of the grate flooring. A little way off there was a cream coloured chair that seemed to be falling apart as it was being held together by duct tape and in the centre was a huge console with strange buttons and lever and knobs. Right in the very middle of the console was a grass tubes with blue stuff moving up and down.

"It's-" Lily started as Mickey collapsed onto his knees and clung tightly to Lily's knee.

"Yes, it's bigger on the inside, yes it is alien, and no I don't have time to talk about it," the Doctor said hurriedly as he moved about the console pressing buttons.

The TARDIS began to shake and Lily and Rose grabbed a hold of a coral column each as Mickey tightened his hold on Rose and there was that wheezing that Lily had only heard once before and after a few moments it stopped again.

"There we go, landed," the Doctor said with a grin, which only Rose returned. Lily was still looking about the place with wide eyes and slack jaw, while Mickey opened up the doors and ran out, terrified.

"Mum!" Lily suddenly exclaimed and she grabbed her phone to call her mother as she followed Mickey from the TARDIS.

"Lily, Lily, you and Rose don't go out the house. It's not safe. There were these things and they were shooting! And they-"

"Mum, mum!" Lily cut in, a relieved smile blooming on her face as her shoulders sagged in relief. "It's fine, I heard, we're safe. Actually properly safe" she sighed, before hanging up when she saw Rose come out of the TARDIS too and the Doctor then stood in the doorway.

Rose went over to Lily and Mickey, the latter of whom was trying to hide behind a pallet. Mickey immediately clings to Rose's middle, pressing his face against her stomach and looking at the Doctor with fear.

"A fat lot of good you were," Rose tells Mickey, just as Lily had done earlier.

"Nestene Consciousness? Easy?" The Doctor grinned.

Lily looked at him with wide eyes. He called that easy? Nearly getting killed, the world nearly ended and god knows how many people actually dead because of all the plastic that had come to life when the transmission was sent, that was easy?

"You were useless in there," Rose said, pointing at the Doctor with a grin. "You'd be dead if it wasn't for me"

"Yes, I would. Thank you," the Doctor said seriously. "Right then, I'll be off, unless, err, I don't know, you could come with me. this box isn't just a London hopper, you know. It goes anywhere in the universe free of charge."

Lily looked from the hopeful look on the Doctors face to the longing one on Rose's and chewed at her lip. She didn't want her sister to leave her. What would she do without Rose? But at the same time, both Rose and the Doctor so clearly wanted her to go.

"Don't," Mickey said, pointing at the Doctor fearfully. "He's an alien. He's a thing"

"He's not invited," said the Doctor, looking at Mickey with distaste. "what do you think? You could stay here, fill your life with work and food and sleep, or you could go anywhere"

"Is it always that dangerous?" Rose asked.

The Doctor nodded, and said "Yeah" with another one of his grins.

Mickey stood up on his knees and put his arm around Rose's waist again, pressing his head into her side as though trying to make sure she couldn't leave, while Lily just watched the scene anxiously, not sure she should get any say in the decision.

"Yeah, I can't. Me and Lily have got to go find my mum and someone's got to look after this stupid lump, so…" Rose said, patting Mickey on the back, with a smile that was so obviously fake.

Lily looked at the disappointment the Doctor was so obviously trying to hide, but the lost look in his eyes and the smile that had gone from his face gave him away.

"Are you lonely?" Lily couldn't help but ask.

The Doctor looked at her in surprise, as though forgetting she was even there. He eyed her for a moment, looking thoughtful.

"Why would I be lonely?" he asked.

"I don't know," she said, not taking her eyes off him. "You and the Nestene spoke about the Time War and planets being lost…what about yours?"

The Doctor looked at her, his face blank but his old eyes filled with anguish and Lily had her answer. He turned away from Lily and looked back to Rose.

"Okay," he said, even though he so clearly felt otherwise. "See you around"

He disappeared into the TARDIS then. After a few seconds the wheezing sound started up again, wind whipped at Lily's hair and the blue police box slowly disappeared from view. Once it had disappeared completely, she looked towards Rose. She had a look of absolute sadness on her face and Lily knew well when her sister was trying not to cry.

Lily bit her lip and stepped forward, gently taking Rose's hand in hers, squeezing it for comfort. Rose looked at her for a moment before swallowing hard.

"Come on," she muttered, helping Mickey, who was staring at the spot the TARDIS had vanished from, to his feet, "let's go. Come on. Come on."

The three of them began to walk off and Lily never took her eyes off of Rose's face. She couldn't think of anything to do or anything to say to make this any better, even though to really wished she did.

Suddenly the wheezing started up again and the three of them whirled back around to see that the TARDIS was reappearing. A small smile was starting to creep up on Rose's face. The TARDIS door opened and the Doctor poked his head out.

"By the way, did I mention it also travels in time?" he asked, smiling.

Rose looked at him with wide eyes before she turned to Lily.

"What do you think?" she asked.

Lily looked at her older sister for a moment. If she was being honest to herself, she wanted to beg Rose to stay, to cling to her elder sister like Mickey had done and make sure she could never leave her. But then she remembered the look of sadness on Rose's face and the almost dead expression she used to wear as she went from day to day doing the same old thing. Lily knew that if she were in Rose's shoes then she would jump at the chance. Rose was her sister and she couldn't be selfish with her.

"Go," she said, forcing a smile. "You should go."

Rose grinned, her eyes lighting up and Lily knew she said the right thing. Rose turned to look at Mickey then and Lily looked at the Doctor, tears filling her eyes. He had better keep her safe. In all that supposed danger that awaited them, the Doctor better keep her safe. The Doctor met her eyes and gave the look he gave her reassured her slightly, as though he knew exactly what she was thinking and was trying to confirm that he would.

"Thanks," Rose said to Mickey.

"Thanks for what?" Mickey asked.

"Exactly," Rose said, and after kissing both Mickey and Lily on the cheeks, she ran off to enter the TARDIS after the Doctor, the door closing behind her.

Lily took a step forward, watching the closed door and the wheezing was emitted again, only stopping when the TARDIS had vanished from sight. Lily sniffed as tears finally spilled out over her cheeks.

"Will he be back?" Mickey asked, sounding rather choked up.

"I hope so," Lily said, swallowing painfully. She turned and wrapped an arm around her best friends shoulders to lead him away. "Come on, let's go find my mum."

**Author's Note: So there it is, chapter one. I didn't want Lily going with the Doctor so soon as I always thought of the ninth Doctor as Rose's Doctor. I was thinking maybe she could travel with them on episode four. I still feel like it would be a bit early for her to go, but I can't think of another episode to successfully right her into where she could be there for the tenth Doctor to regenerate, which is what I want. I want the tenth Doctor to be her Doctor. The first face he sees so that she's seared onto his hearts forever. **

**Anyway, REVIEW as to whether you think I should continue the story! I know I have quite a few stories going at one, but my minds all over the place at the moment so I can't focus on just one thing. **


	2. Aliens in London

Chapter Two

_Aliens in London_

Lily thought the hardest thing she would ever have to do was to let Rose go, but she was wrong. This was infinitely harder. This…waiting. A whole year. A whole year searching on street corners and listening out for that achingly familiar wheezing sound just hoping against hope that this time her sister and that strange Doctor would be returning.

Lily had glimpsed into the Doctor's life, had seen the danger and the absolute terror and now, after the longest year of her life, she had to wonder if Rose was ever actually coming back. The Doctor had said the danger was always there. What if Rose hadn't been so lucky? What if she was actually…gone. Gone like their father. Gone like Mickey's grandmother. It was the not knowing that hurt her the most.

However, no matter how hard it was for Lily, she knew it was so much worse for their mum. She has no clue what happened, has no clue whatsoever that Rose did nothing other than disappear. She had been sending out posters and organising search parties, desperately hoping that she wouldn't lose Rose like she lost their dad. Mum also starting clinging to Lily with all she had. Lily tried to make it easier on her, by keeping her updated on where she was at all times, calling when she left the house and when she got back, but she knew it wasn't enough. Lily was suffering the loss just as badly and that meant her mum had to see her walking around and breathing, but not really living as she once did.

On a dull, grey Tuesday, Lily dressed herself in skinny jeans, a graphic T, her usual grey hoodie and converse, a turquoise beanie to match her nails and fingerless gloves, and she headed over to Mickey's flat, making sure to dodge anyone who was on regular speaking terms with her mum, which turned out to be more people than she thought.

When Mickey opened the door he was wearing a grey t-shirt and a pair of boxers, just like he did most of the time when he was home alone.

"Hey, Mickey," she greeted with a small quirk of the lips and kissed him on the cheek in greeting. "I told my mum that I got called into the hospital, so I can be here for a while"

Lily had finally started a psychology training programme at the local hospital, although she did work at Finch's butchers on her evenings and weekends. Lily hated the job, but she had to find some way to help her mum with the bills now that they didn't have Rose's pay check coming in as well.

"Right, and last time you were visiting Shareen, the time before that you were going shopping, and what was the time before that one? Oh, right, taking a walk," Mickey said rather bitterly as he closed the door behind her and they made their way into the kitchen where Lily began to wash to mugs and Mickey put the kettle on.

Lily sighed, looking at Mickey in sympathy.

"I know. It's not my fault. You know my mum doesn't want me seeing you, what with everything," Lily said, grimacing and Mickey scowled, leaning against the counter.

"What with her whispering around that I killed Rose, you mean," Mickey said and he looked away.

Lily followed his gaze and saw that he was looking at a pile of letters on the countertop and she narrowed her blue eyes. Quickly putting the two clean mugs on the side and drying her hands, she moved to snatch up the letters and flipped through them, seeing that they were from no one she recognised.

"They're still doing this?" Lily demanded angrily, glaring at Mickey, who just shrugged in response.

Scowling, she tore all the letters into halves and then into quarters before chucking them into the bin. People from all over the estate had been posting utterly vicious things through Mickey's letterbox and it was grating on her last nerve.

"Speaking of, guess where I was yesterday morning," Mickey said.

Lily studied his expression for only a second before sighing, able to detect exactly what he meant after so many years of being best friends.

"The Police Station, again?" Lily asked, closing her eyes for a moment to rub at her temples in severed annoyance. "Isn't that the fourth time now?"

"Fifth," Mickey corrected as he began to make tea. "Since it's the one year anniversary of her 'disappearance' they wanted to bring me in for questioning again."

Lily sighed again. When it had been clear Rose hadn't just gone away for a couple of days, Mickey became a prime suspect and her mum didn't help matters, pointing fingers in his direction also. It was hard, because neither she or Mickey could say anything about what actually happened, because who would believe them if they did?

Mickey handed her one of the mugs of tea and kept the other for himself. She took a deep sip as he led her back to his bedroom where his computer was.

"Did you find anything else on The Doctor?" Lily asked, moving some dirty clothes out of the way to perch on the edge of his bed as Mickey sat down on the swivel chair in front of his desk.

"Well, it was difficult, but I dug deeper and found this place called UNIT. I hacked into their system, getting through the instillation protocols to get into the sub-frame-" Mickey started and Lily blinked blankly at him.

"Mick!" Lily cut in, making him look up from the computer. "I don't understand any of that technical stuff, so just tell me what you found," she said giving him a small smile.

"Just look," he said, turning his screen and Lily put her cup of tea on the desk so that she could lean down beside Mickey to look at the screen.

"He used to work there?" she asked in surprise.

"Yep. Supposed to be the best alien expert out there," he said with a scoff, and Lily couldn't help but chuckle under her breathe. She didn't doubt that he was the best expert, considering he was an alien.

She used the mouse to scroll down slightly and clicked on one of the links on the sight, frowning when a list of names popped up.

"Tina Freeman…George Thomas…Justine Argent…what is that?" Lily asked, her brows furrowing.

"A list of the dead," Mickey said and Lily's eyes snapped to his face in shock. "It seems one is always involved when the Doctors name pops up."

Lily bit her lip, sharing an extremely worried look with her best friend. She hoped Rose was okay, but what was the alternative? That she just left with a virtual stranger and forgot about her family for a whole year?

**Aliens In London**

"Mum, I'm home!" Lily called, dropping her keys on the kitchen counter and moving into the living room so that she could flop down onto the settee.

"Okay, sweetheart," Mum's voice came from her bedroom.

Lily sighed at the relief that was evident in her mum's voice. It seemed that whenever Lily left the house now she was in a perpetual state of worry and Lily hated it. If only she could somehow tell her mum the truth and actually get her to believe it. The news had said that the thing with the dummies had been one great big hoax and everyone believed it, moving on as though nothing had happened, so Lily didn't have a leg to stand on if she told the real truth.

She leaned forward and grabbed one of the flyers from the kitchen table. It was a missing person's poster for Rose. She looked sadly at the picture of her sister grinning and ran a finger over her face. Putting the flyer back on the pile she put her head in her hands and swallowed painfully, willing herself not to cry. She just missed Rose. Missed her so much that her insides burned with it.

Lily's head snapped up when she heard the flat door open and she wiped furiously at the few stray tears that had slipped down her cheek. She frowned walked towards the door, but she froze when it was in sight her eyes widening and her jaw going slack.

It was Rose.

Rose was standing right there. With that wide grin on her face that Lily hadn't seen in so long, not on her sisters face and not on her own. Rose's eyes lit up when she caught sight of Lily, her grin widening as she put her keys on the side just as Lily had before.

"Hey, Lil," Rose greeted as though nothing had happened. "So, what's been going on? How've you been?"

Lily surged forward and pulled Rose in the tightest hug imaginable. She buried her face in Rose's hair and breathed in the familiar scent of her older sister as Rose hugged her tightly back. A few tears leaked out of Lily's eyes again and she gave a breathy laugh in relief. Her sister was here. She was safe. She was perfectly fine and she was here.

"Mum!" Lily shouted in delight, pulling away from the hug. "Mum! It's Rose! She's here, she's actually, properly here!"

Lily missed the looked of confusion on Rose's face as she all but bounced on the balls of her feet. She heard something smash from her mum's room and a moment later she came running out in her usual silk dressing gown.

Mum's face had gone blank in shock as she stared at Rose, looking like she couldn't quite belief what she was seeing, hardly daring herself to hope.

"It's you," mum breathed.

Rose's brows furrowed and tried to share a look with Lily like they usual did when their mum was being weird, but Lily was just grinning, tears filling her blue eyes and Rose's expression just became even more confused.

"Of course it's me," Rose said in a completely bewildered voice.

"Oh, my God. It's you. Oh my god," mum cried, rushing forward to grab Rose into a hug.

Absolutely giddy with her sister's returned Lily quickly joined the hug too, clinging tightly and hoping she never has to go through this again. Rose looked over her mum's and sister's shoulders and her eyes widened when she finally caught sight of the piles of missing person's leaflets all over the living room.

Suddenly the door swung open again and Lily pulled away from the three person hug just in time to see the Doctor rush in, slightly breathless from the many stairs he had to run up to get to the flat.

"It's not twelve hours, it's twelve months, you've been gone a whole year," the Doctor said to Rose, making Lily frown at her sister in confusion. Then he turned to Lily and their mum with a grin and said, "Sorry."

**Aliens in London**

As their mum got on the phone to the police to say that Rose had returned, Lily took her sister into her bedroom with her. Rose was eyeing Lily with slight trepidation. Lily hadn't said anything since the Doctor had walked in and her face was scarily blank, giving Rose no insight as to what she was thinking.

Finally, as they both sat on Lily's bed, she said, "A year, Rose, you were gone a whole year."

Rose swallowed thickly, not taking her eyes off of her sister's expression, which had suddenly become very pained with tears in her eyes. Rose hated it when her sister cried and always did whatever she could to make it better, but how could she make it better when she was the cause of it?

"I'm sorry," was all Rose could say.

Lily huffed out a breathy laugh which held no humour, and she shook her head in disbelief.

"You're sorry, you're sorry? That's all you've got to say?" Lily demanded, her eyes narrowed. "You have no idea what it's been like. Searching and listening out for any sign of the TARDIS, any sign that you were coming back, but to find none. I've seen the Doctor's world, I've seen how dangerous it was…I thought you were dead Rose!" Lily cried and a few tears spilled out as her voice cracked.

Rose's brown eyes filled with tears then and she sniffed, not able to meet her sister's eyes. She knew what that felt like. When Mickey and Lily had been taken by the Nestene Consciousness and she thought her little sister was dead, the pain was unfathomable. It felt like she could have bled to death with the pain of it and she couldn't believe she had put Lily through that.

"And, mum! You have no idea how hard it's been, mum crying when she thinks I can't hear her. You should have been here on your birthday Rose! Neither of us could barely even get out of bed-"

"-I'm sorry!" Rose exclaimed, unable to hear any more as tears began to fall down her cheeks. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry, okay? I never meant for this to happen, I never meant-"

Lily pulled Rose into a tight hug then, both sister's grabbing at each other with desperate fingers, trying to remind themselves that the other was there as they began to cry in earnest. It had been a while since Lily had cried like this for Rose, not a few months since her Rose's birthday as she was always trying to be the strong one for mum, but now she was able to let it all out and it felt like a dam had broken.

Finally, Lily pulled away, sniffing and wiping her wet cheeks. She took a deep breath and let it out slowly, her shoulders slumping. Lily and Rose shared a look before they both fell back in sync and lay on Lily's bed, their blonde hair splaying together across the blue bedspread. They used to do this all the time. Just lay together in silence or talking about anything and everything. It was just one of the other million things Lily had missed about her sister.

"What happened, Rose? You didn't even call…" Lily said.

Rose sighed, turned her head to look at Lily.

"It's only been a few days to me. Just a few days and with everything going on I just…" Rose tailed off.

"Forgot?" Lily finished, setting her jaw as hurt coursed through her. Her sister had forgotten about her. They usual spent absolutely every day with each other and she just…forgot.

"You know I love you…I love you more than anyone," Rose said, her voice cracking slightly. "I'm sorry…" she said again.

Lily released a shaky breath.

"I know. I know you are," she said.

They lay there in silence for a moment and Rose's hand found Lily's so that she could weaving her fingers through her little sister's and squeeze to remind her that she was here now, and she had no intention of leaving Lily behind again. Even if it meant begging the Doctor to let her come with them…or telling him she had to leave. Rose was declaring right here, she was never leaving her sister again.

"Well…it's been a year," Lily started and Rose turned her head to look at her, "I'm nineteen now. We might as well be twins," she turned her head too and shot Rose a cheeky grin.

A grin bloomed on Rose's face and the two of them began to laugh.

"Okay, so catch me up," Lily said, sitting up and crossing her legs Indian style on the bed so she could face Rose. "Catch me up."

Rose propped herself up on her elbows, grinned, and began to tell Lily about her adventures in Platform One and how Cassandra, a flap of skin who proclaimed herself the last human, tried to sabotage the watching of the burning of the earth just to get money. Her travel to Naples, 1969, which ended up being a trip to Christmas in Cardiff, 1960, resulting in her meeting Charles Dickens and defeating ghost-like creatures called the Gelth who manipulated them in order to take people's bodies. Finally there was a trip to the 455th century where people were seemingly getting killed by invisible aliens, but it turned out to be an abandoned ship's computer moving on an emergency programme, which the Doctor repaired.

**Aliens in London**

It didn't take long for the police to come and start interrogating Rose on where she had been. The Policeman, Tom as he had told her (she made it a point to learn everyone's name), didn't seem all that worried, seeming content to allow mum to ask most of the questions. Lily suspected Rose wasn't the first person in the Powell Estate to just take off without warning anyone.

Lily was perched on the arm of the chair Rose was curled up on, her sister seemed to be trying to avoid mum's eyes. The Doctor was standing just behind them, his hands clasped together in front of him and he was watching the scene with a fairly guilty look.

Lily couldn't help but wonder about him. All those lists of the dead that seemed to follow him wherever he went. She had seen what he had done last year with the living plastic, so perhaps the fact he was there had nothing to do with it, more that he turned up to help. She couldn't help but worry though. She suspected that the Doctor sometimes forgets that real life goes on, that humans aren't as infallible as…whatever alien he is, Time Lord did Rose say?

She looked away from the Doctor and instead looked at the scene going on. Mum was pacing the room, only ever pausing to shout at Rose or to glare at her.

"The hours Lily and I have sat here, days and weeks and months, all on our own. We thought you were dead, and where were you? Travelling. What the hell does that mean, travelling?" their mum was saying. "That's no sort of answer," she turned to Tom the police man then and said, "you ask her. She won't tell me. that's all she says. Travelling."

"That's what I was doing," Rose muttered in answer.

"When your passport's still in the drawer?" Mum challenged, leaning closer to Rose and pointing towards the drawer in question. "It's just one lie after another."

"I meant to phone," Rose said, sounding rather choked up and her eyes were shining brighter than usual. "I really did. I just – I forgot"

"What, for a year? You forgot for a year? I just don't believe you," Mum said, moving to stand in front of the settee. "Why won't you tell me where you've been?" she asked, her voice marginally quieter.

"Actually, that's my fault," the Doctor put in and Lily and Rose glanced at each other before looking up at the Doctor, wondering where he was going with this. "I sort of err, employed Rose as my companion," he grinned.

Lily winced, knowing that this excuse was going to no good. She was starting to understand why the Doctor never involved the police last year with the Nestene Consciousness, he didn't seem all that good at knowing the right things to say.

"When you say companion, is this a sexual relationship?" Tom the policeman asked.

"No," both the Doctor and Rose said, looking at the policeman as though he were insane to even suggest it.

"Then what is it?" Mum asked, moving forward angrily to get right up in the Doctor face. "Because you, you waltz in here all charm and smiles, and the next thing I know, she vanishes off the face of the Earth! How old are you then? Forty? Forty five? What did you find her on the internet? Did you go online and pretend you're a doctor?"

"I am a doctor," the Doctor said defensively.

"Prove it. Stitch this, mate!" mum snapped and then she slapped the Doctor in the face.

Lily's blue eyes widened and she was so surprised that she actually slipped from the arm of the chair and fell into Rose's lap. Lily and Rose shared a look, half part sympathy and half part amusement, as the Doctor made a sound of pain and put a hand to his cheek. When the Doctor straightened up again he looked utterly astonished at such a thing occurring. Lily didn't know why he was all that surprised, if you take a woman's daughter away from her for a year, you're going to get slapped. He was just lucky Lily wasn't the type to hold a grudge or she was sure she would cause him some bodily harm as well.

Not soon after Tom the Policeman left, Mum took Rose into the kitchen to talk to her properly now she had gotten her anger out, so Lily took the Doctor up to the roof, telling Rose to meet them there when they were done talking.

As the Doctor looked out over the Powell Estate from where they were sitting, Lily watched him. She didn't know anything about this man. This man who had save the world, this man who had taken her sister away from her for a whole year, but seemed to be someone Rose trusted explicitly. She found herself wanting to understand him, because he was so much harder than anyone else on Earth. Perhaps it was because he wasn't from Earth, he had seen and suffered so much more and Lily was intrigued to no end.

"Your race…the Time Lords, was it? There are more of you, yeah?" Lily asked curiously.

The Doctor didn't turn to look at her, but she knew he heard as his jaw clenched and a look of absolute sadness and pain and regret cemented itself into his ancient eyes. Lily made her first discovery about him then. He seemed to have a lot of sorrow and anger inside of him, she decided that the manic energy and sharp, offbeat wit she had seen in him was a façade to hide the pain within.

"No, just me," he said, almost flippantly, but Lily knew he cared. From the stories Rose told her he seemed to care more than most. "The war that the Nestene Consciousness told you about, the Time War. My people fought in it, and we lost. Everybody lost. The last Great Time War and Gallifrey burned, I'm the only Time Lord left."

He got a distant look in his eyes and Lily bit her lip. She was normally good at comforting people, but losing your entire race? Your planet and your home? This was loss on a scale that she didn't even know what to do with, so she settled for reaching out a hand and taking his in hers. The Doctor looked down at their hands for a moment before he looked at Lily and gave her a small smile, which looked more like a grimace, squeezing her hand.

Rose came up then, and the Doctor dropped Lily's hand immediately. Lily reckoned he didn't let himself be vulnerable for more than a moment, just a moment and then he would stitch himself up and run again. Just how far must he have run to come all the way to Earth?

"How did it go?" Lily asked as her sister perched herself on the other side of Lily.

Rose sighed, giving Lily all she needed to know and Lily wrapped her arm around her older…well, they were the same age now weren't they?...sister's shoulders.

"I'm sure she'll come around," Lily said comfortingly, her blue eyes soft.

Rose just shook her head and sighed again.

"I can't tell her," she said. "I can't even begin. She's never going to forgive me. And I missed a year. Was it good?"

Lily's brows rose.

"You're asking me? I was having trouble with the fact that my sister was missing for a year, I have no idea," Lily cried.

"You're so useless," Rose scoffed.

"Well, if it's this much trouble, are you going to stay here now?" the Doctor put in, gaining both girls' attention.

Lily quickly saw past the flippant attitude he was putting up and could tell he was extremely reluctant with the idea of Rose staying home. It must be hard. Being the last of your race, maybe the idea of losing a friend just made it that much harder. Lily couldn't even begin to fathom what the Doctor went through, but she knew one thing, when suffering with loss, no matter how big or small, no one should ever be alone.

"I don't know," Rose said and Lily turned to see the same reluctance of her sister's face to. "I'm not leaving Lily again though," she said firmly and Lily bit her lip, trying to hide how pleased she was with that. "Do you think, maybe, I don't know, she could come with us?"

Lily looked at Rose in surprise at the question. She never thought that he sister would try and get her to come along, but she was glad she did, it showed she cared, and Lily needed that after a whole year without her. Lily turned to the Doctor then, donning the same hopeful expression that Rose was wearing. She thought back to the stories Rose told her and how could she not want that? Long for something more that the same day to day thing. She was reminded of Oscar Wilde's, Lady Windermere's Fan: "We're all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars," Lily actually had the chance to touch the stars, and she hoped the Doctor would let her.

The Doctor crossed his arms over his chest, his forehead wrinkling as he looked at Lily thoughtfully.

"I reckon so," The Doctor said finally.

"Thank you!" Lily cried, throwing her arms around the Doctor so that he let out a laugh, grinning from ear to ear and Rose whooped, wearing that famous Tyler grin that was currently on Lily's face too.

The three of them sat there for a moment, just grinning at what brilliance was no doubt to come, before the Doctor suddenly looked at them sternly, pointing a warning finger in their faces.

"Your mother's not coming though," he said.

Lily and Rose both laughed. Lily suddenly felt lighter and happier than she had in a long time, and she could only hope that as she spent more and more time with Rose and the Doctor that the feeling would continue.

"No chance," Rose laughed.

"I don't do families," the Doctor said, crossing his arms again.

"She slapped you!" Rose exclaimed, making Lily laugh even harder as she recalled the incident of not that long ago.

"Nine hundred years of time and space, and I've never been slapped by someone's mother," said the Doctor, sounding rather affronted and grimacing slightly.

"The look on your face though," Lily teased with a grin, making Rose chuckle in remembrance.

"It hurt!" said the Doctor, rubbing a hand over his cheek as he had when it had first happened.

"You're so gay," Rose laughed.

Lily chuckled for a moment before he mind caught up with what the Doctor had said: 'Nine hundred years of time and space'…

"What do you mean nine hundred years…?" Lily asked slowly, her brows furrowed.

"That's my age," the Doctor stated.

"You're nine hundred years old?" Rose repeated.

"Yeah" the Doctor nodded.

Lily and Rose shared an utterly surprised look, scarcely able to believe it, but then again he is an alien with a bigger on the inside blue box and the universe inside his head. Lily and Rose both schooled their features and nodded.

"Our mum was right," Rose said. "That is one hell of age gap." She sighed then and got to her feet, taking a few steps away from Lily and the Doctor. "Every conversation with you just goes mental. There's no one else I can talk to. I've seen all that stuff up there, the size of it, and I can't say a word. Aliens and spaceships and things, and Lily and I are the only people on planet earth who know they exist"

Lily opened her mouth to say that she sincerely doubted that, but in that moment there was a deep horn and the three of them jumped in shock, turning. Lily gasped and ducked with the other three as a space ship, trailing black smoke, passed overhead and headed for the city. They stood and watched its progress with slack jaws and wide eyes.

Lily blinked, staring at the black smoke rise into the air on the horizon.

"Oh that's just not fair," Rose breathed.

From beside her the Doctor already wore a giant grin and let out an excited laugh. Lily and Rose looked up at him and couldn't help but grin themselves and the three of them began to run, fully intending to get a closer look.

**Aliens in London**

By the time the three of them skidded to a stop, traffic was completely halted, people exclaiming in annoyance, car horns blaring. The army seemed to have closed the roads using their huge green trucks, holding guns and ushering people away.

"It's blocked off," the Doctor stated.

"Well, we can see that," Lily said, panting slightly and holding her side from all the running, not at all as used to it as Rose and the Doctor.

"We're miles from the centre," Rose said, sounding only slightly winded. "The city must be grid locked. The whole of London must be closing down."

"I know," the Doctor exclaimed. "I can't believe I'm here to see this. This is fantastic!"

Lily and Rose said a look before looking up at the Doctor in bemusement. He was grinning widely, practically bouncing on the balls of his feet.

"Did you know this was going to happen?" Lily asked incredulously. "Has this got something to do with you? Because so far the only times I've seen anything unusual has been when you were there"

"Nope," the Doctor stated, still practically beaming with unconcealed joy.

"Do you recognise the ship?" Rose asked.

"Nope"

"Do you know why it crashed?" she tried again.

"Nope"

Lily and Rose shared another glance before they both sighed in annoyance at his lack of foreknowledge.

"Oh, we're so glad we've got you," Rose breathed sardonically.

"I bet you are," The Doctor grinned, completely ignoring her tone. "this is what I travel for, Rose, Lily. To see history happening right in front of us."

Lily looked at him for a moment before a slow smile appeared on her face. It was as though his excitement was seeping from him and Lily couldn't help but feel the least bit giddy at this event that cut through the melancholy of her day to day life.

"Let's go and see it then," Lily said in excitement.

"Yeah," Rose agreed with a nod. "Never mind the traffic, we've got the TARDIS"

"Better not," said the Doctor, finally calming down slightly. "Already got one spaceship in the middle of London. I don't want to shove another one on top."

"Yeah, but yours looks like a big blue box. No one's going to notice," Rose pointed out.

"Oh, you'd be surprised. Emergency like this, there'll be all kinds of people watching," the Doctor said. "Trust me. the TARDIS stays where it is" he said firmly.

"So, history's happening and we're stuck here," Rose summed up, not sounding at all amused, and she and Lily shared another aggravated look.

"Yes we are," the Doctor said, craning his neck so that he could see what was going on up ahead better.

"I guess it's time for the human approach then," Lily said, making the Doctor look at her questioningly, but Rose already seemed to have picked up where she was going with this.

"We watch it on the Telly," the two sisters said in sync.

The Doctor got a funny look on his face then, as though the thought would have never occurred to him had Lily not have pointed it out. It seemed the 'human approach' was something a Time Lord didn't spend all that much time doing.

**Aliens in London**

When they got back to the flat, mum had already invited Ru Chan, from the flat above there's over, and Lily knew without a doubt that more people would be coming. It was just like their mum to jump at the chance to gather people, whether it was to welcome Rose home or to celebrate the alien ship crashing Lily couldn't tell, she wouldn't be surprise if it was both knowing their mother.

Lily and Rose both curled up on the settee, while Ru sat at the kitchen table, their mum made tea, and the Doctor claimed the arm chair in order to turn on News 24.

"Big Ben destroyed as a UFO crash lands in Central London," the Reporter said. "Police reinforcements are drafted in from across the country to control widespread panic, looting and civil disturbance. A state of national emergency has been declared. Tom Hitchenson is at the scene."

The camera switched over to the man in question.

"The police are urging the public not to panic. There's a help line number on the screen right now if you're worried about friends or family," Hitchenson said as a number in red block letters appeared beneath his image.

The Doctor grabbed the remote and flipped the channel onto AMNN to watch the US news in order to see what they had to say on the matter.

"The military are on the lookout for more spaceships," the woman said. "Until then, all flights in North America air space have been grounded"

The Doctor flipped the channel back to News 24 just long enough to hear Hitchenson say: "The army are sending divers into the wreck of the spaceship. No one knows what they're going to find" before he switched it back again.

"The President will address the nation live from the White House, but the Secretary General has asked that people watch the skies" the woman from AMNN said.

Both Lily and Rose were looking from the Doctor, to the TV, and back again, Rose biting her thumb nail nervously. Lily was carefully studying his expression to see if he was noticing anything they were missing with his superior knowledge on the subject. All Lily could pick up was that it didn't seem all that threatening seeing as the one ship mentioned had crashed accidentally, but she couldn't help but wonder if the Doctor saw something else.

She looked away from the man only when her mum came back from the kitchen with mugs of tea for Ru, Lily and Rose, but she didn't have one for the Doctor. Lily wasn't all that surprised. Both she and Rose had tried to get her to be more accommodating to the man, but to no avail, they were lucky she even allowed him back into the flat.

"I've got no choice," Mum was saying to Ru in answer as to why the Doctor was there.

"You've broken your mother's heart," Ru was saying angrily to Rose, gesturing with her hands like she always did when she spoke, completely speaking over mum.

"I'm not going to make him welcome," Mum said, not minding at all that they were speaking at the same time, Lily reckoned that was how they all communicated, mum and her friends were all chatty.

"I cradled her like a baby," Ru continued.

"Ru, just leave it, yeah?!" Lily exclaimed, finally having enough of it. She hardly needed reminding how distraught her mum was, not that she was that much better when she realised Rose might not be coming back.

Ru visibly bristled at the interruption.

"And you!" she began again, this time turning her glare onto Lily. "Letting that man in here like it's nothing, completely forgetting what he'd done to you and your poor mother-"

Lily sighed in annoyance, straightening the beanie on her head and was extremely relieved when the Doctor cut in.

"Oi, I'm trying to listen," he said, glaring at everyone for just a moment before turning back to the Telly and Lily began to watching him watching the screen again.

"-his current whereabouts," a Reporter standing outside 10 Downing Street was saying. "News is just coming in. We can go to Tom at the Embankment."

The camera switched back to Hitchenson, who was still standing beside the Thames.

"They've found a body," he said and Lily saw the Doctor's brows rise but he didn't look altogether shocked. "It's unconfirmed, but I'm being told a body has been found in the wreckage. A body of non-terrestrial origins. It's being brought ashore."

There was a knock at the door and their mum quickly bustled to let more people into the flat. Just as Lily predicted the gathering was turning into a small party, now with wine being served.

"A body of some sort has been found inside the wreckage of the spacecraft," Hitchenson went on.

"Oh, guess who asked me out," their mum smiled, standing from when she was perched beside Lily on the arm of the settee. "Billy Crewe."

Lily looked up at her mum then, the woman stealing her attention.

"Ooh, really?" she asked, her brows rising in surprise. "He's rather fit for an older bloke"

"Lily," Rose hissed jabbing her in the back, from where she was being spoken to by everyone who were 'just so happy she was back', and nodded towards the TV, indicating that if she couldn't watch then she had to.

"Right," Lily said rather sheepishly and watched the news again, trying to drown out her mum talking to Ru and everyone else who had joined them in the flat.

"-Brought to the nearest short," Hitchenson was saying. "Unconfirmed reports say that the body is of extra-terrestrial origin. An extraordinary event unfolding here live in Central London. The body is being transferred to a secure unit mortuary, the whereabouts is yet unknown. The roads in Central London are being-"

Lily jumped slightly in surprise as the channel flipped over to Blue Peter when Matt Baker was showing you how to make a spaceship cake. Looking around she couldn't help but let out a laugh as she saw that the Doctor was now wrestling little Charlie, Debby's son, for the Remote.

"Lily, you shut up!" the Doctor exclaimed, narrowing his eyes and pointing a finger at her in a faux threatening manner.

Lily chuckled again before holding her hands up in a surrendering gesture.

"Charlie, come here mate," Lily cooed and Charlie rushed over to sit in her lap so that she could get the remote from him and turn the news back on.

The Doctor only nodded to her in thanks and went back to watching the screen now that New 24 had returned.

"-Albion Hospital," Hitchenson said. "We still don't know whether it's alive or dead. Whitehall is denying everything, but the body has been brought here, Albion Hospital. The road's closed off. It's closest to the river."

Lily jiggled her legs up and down to keep Charlie calm on her lap and watched the Doctor lean forward in his seat, his brow furrowed. Lily narrowed her blue eyes at him suspiciously. The way he was acting certainly didn't fit with his idea of sitting back and letting it play out. He was taking an interest in this and Lily wanted to know why.

"I'm being told that General Asquith is now entering the hospital," Hitchenson went on. "The buildings been evacuated. The patients have been moved out onto the streets"

Lily's brows furrowed and she frowned. Those poor patients. There was a crash landing and now all of them had to go out onto the streets. That was absolutely awful.

"The police still won't confirm the presence of an alien body contained inside those walls," Hitchenson said.

The camera flipped to Andrew Marr reporting from outside 10 Downing Street.

"Mystery still surrounds the whereabouts of the Prime Minister. He's not been seen since the emergency began. The opposition are criticising his lack of leadership and…hold on," Andrew Marr turned as an official looking car pulled up and a portly man got out. "Oh, that's Joseph Green, MP for Hartley Dale. He's chairman of the Parliamentary Commission on the monitoring of sugar standards in exported confectionary. With respect, hardly the most important person right now."

Lily was so busy frowning at the telly for the strange absence of the Prime Minister that she visibly startled when the Doctor got to his feet. He didn't say a word as he made his way through the people in the flat towards the door.

"Hey, Charlie, go find your mum for me sweetheart," Lily told Charlie with a smile, setting him on the ground to run and find Debby.

She got to her feet and hastily made way after the Doctor. Rose soon doing the same when she noticed what had happened.

"And where do you think you're going?" Rose demanded as she and Lily caught up with the Doctor just outside of the flat.

"Nowhere," the Doctor shrugged and Lily raised a sceptical brow. "It's just a bit human in there for me. History just happened and they're talking about where you can buy dodgy top-up cards for half price. I'm off on a wander, that's all."

"Right," Rose scoffed. "There's a spaceship on the Thames and you're just wandering."

"Nothing to do with me. it's not an invasion. That was a genuine crash landing. Angle of descent, colour of smoke, everything. It's perfect," Lily didn't know if she imagined it, but she was sure something flashed in his eyes when he said the word perfect.

"So?" Rose asked, brows furrowed.

"So maybe this is it," the Doctor said. "First contact. The day mankind officially comes into contact with an alien race. I'm not interfering because you've got to handle this on your own. That's when the human race finally grows up. Just this morning you were all tiny and small and made of clay. Now you can expand. You don't need me," he nodded towards the open door behind them where they could hear David Bowie singing Starman on the radio. "Go and celebrate history. Spend some time with your mum"

Lily could tell that Rose was being convinced, but she still seemed slightly hesitant.

"Promise you won't disappear?" she asked, narrowing her eyes.

The Doctor didn't answer for a moment, before suddenly he grinned.

"Tell you what," he began to root around in the inner pockets of his leather jacket before he pulled out a single key on a chain and handed it to Rose. "TARDIS key. It's about time you had one. See you later"

Before Rose could do much more that bite back a smile at being allowed a key, the Doctor was off again. When a second later Rose returned to the party, Lily ran to catch up with the Doctor. He didn't slow down his pace down the stairs as she caught up, and didn't even look at her.

"I couldn't help but notice that you didn't promise," Lily said, her voice taking on a rather accusatory tone.

"Great observational skills," The Doctor commented shortly and Lily rolled her eyes, after a year she had almost forgotten how aggravating a conversation with him was.

"I want to come with you," Lily blurted before she could stop herself.

The Doctor stopped only for a second, just long enough to turn to her and say, "I'm not going anywhere…and no"

Lily sighed and quickly followed him down the stairs, grabbing his leather clad arm to stop him again so that he would look at her while she was talking.

"You take me with you, or I will go back up to that flat and tell my mum you are just dying to tell her everything you and Rose got up to on your travels," she said strongly, putting her hands on her hips and raising her brows challengingly.

The Doctor considered her for a moment.

"You hide that devious side well," he commented and Lily shrugged.

The Doctor turned and began to descend the stairs again. Lily sighed, knowing that she wouldn't be able to convince him and was just about to turn to go back up to the flat when the Doctor stopped and looked at her expectantly.

"Well, come on then," he said.

Lily perked up and one of the famous Tyler grins appeared on her face as she hastened to follow him, a skip practically in her step. The Doctor grinned too, feeling Lily's enthusiasm seep into him, it was one of the main reason he enjoyed having companions so much: they looked at the adventures with such joy that he actually began to get that feeling again.

Lily followed the Doctor into the TARDIS, and once she did she grinned. Last time she was in here she was too overcome with panic and shock from the living plastic that she didn't really take that much time taking the ship in. The console had a stunning blue glow and the almost tattered furniture and the controls, which looked as though it had been fixed with random junk from a garage, just showed how much the ship had been through. It was beautiful.

Lily jumped when she heard the tell-tale wheezing sound of the TARDIS taking flight and she had to grab onto one of the coral beams to her left.

"What's wrong with it?" Lily called over to the Doctor, who was darting about the controls, pulling different levers and twisting different knobs. The TARDIS didn't sound like it was running well at all, not to mention all the shaking.

"Not an it, a she!" the Doctor called back, he had now resorted to pulling out a large hammer, and he began to hit the console to sort it out.

"What?" Lily shouted in confusion.

"The TARDIS is a she!" he said loudly. The TARDIS finally came to a shuddering landing and Lily sighed in relief, letting go of the beam and straightening her beanie. "TARDISs are grown, not built, she's alive"

Lily looked at the Doctor with wide eyes.

"The TARDIS…is a living thing?" Lily said slowly.

"Yep!" The Doctor grinned, popping the p, before moving past her to exit the TARDIS.

Lily looked about the TARDIS with new eyes, and, although she didn't want to admit it, rather weary ones too. She was standing inside a living thing. A living thing that could fly through time and space. Now that she thought about it, she could feel a presence in the back of her mind. Was that the TARDIS? Just as she thought of it, the TARDIS gave a hum, and Lily jumped. She bit her lip, and after a lingering look on the console, followed the Doctor.

The TARDIS seemed to have parked herself in a store room, so Lily had to squint slightly to get used to the dark room. she moved to stand behind the Doctor, who had pulled out his sonic screwdriver to unlock the door.

"Shh!" Lily hissed to the Doctor as the sonic screwdriver made an odd whirring noise. She wasn't sure exactly where they were, but she could guess that they were somewhere they weren't supposed to be, and the last thing she needed was to get caught.

"It's not me, it's this," the Doctor whispered back in affront.

"Well, you're the one that made it," Lily replied smartly.

The Doctor opened the door and they walked into a room full of red berets – the Parachute Regiment. They stare at each other in silence for a moment, then the soldiers grabbed their weapons and point them at Lily and the Doctor. Lily's eyes go comically wide, and she shoots an annoyed look at the Doctor, who grinned at her sheepishly. It seemed that this wasn't a new experience for him.

Suddenly Lily jumped when she heard a scream in the distance. Everyone else in the room clearly heard it too and as they all looked in the direction of the far door.

"Defence plan delta! Come on. Move! Move!" the Doctor shouts in a commanding voice that makes it easier for Lily too imagine him being part of the time war.

The Doctor grabbed Lily's hand and pulled her out of the room, the Soldiers hastening to follow. The Doctor, and in association Lily, lead the Marines out of the room at the double.

"Spread out," the Doctor told the closest soldier. "Tell the perimeter it's on lockdown" for a moment the soldier just stared at him, and Lily didn't blame him, this was an order from a stranger and his friend who appeared to have snuck into the hospital through the store cupboard. "Do it!" the Doctor added sharply and this time the soldier listened.

"Mick, Terry, side room. now!" he ordered and the soldiers began to spread out, yelling things like "clear!" and "keep it moving!"

The Doctor leads Lily further through the hospital in the direction where Lily supposed the scream must have come from. Clearly Time Lords must have superior hearing or something as Lily wouldn't have known where to go. They reach the room at the end of the hallway, which, with a shiver, Lily realised was the Mortuary.

When Lily and the Doctor entered the room, they quickly spot a female doctor, cowering by her desk, a cut on her forehead that was still bleeding. The room was in a state of disarray…looking almost as if someone, or something, had rushed about in a panic.

The woman looks up at them fearfully, still shaking slightly, "I swear it was dead"

"Coma, shock, hibernation, anything," the Doctor crouched down beside her and Lily quickly followed his example. "What does it look like?" he asked.

Lily jumped, unconsciously moving closer to the Doctor when metal clattering echoed around the room.

"It's still here," the Doctor breathed.

Lily eyes were wide, her heart thumping so hard in her chest that she was surprised everyone didn't hear it. She was in the same room as an alien. An actual proper alien, not like a big vat of plastic, but an alien that had come to earth in a spaceship.

The Doctor lifted one of his hands an gestured for a soldier outside the door to come in and kneel by the three of them. Lily watched with bated breath as the Doctor, slowly and quietly, began to make his way further into the room. Her eyes began to water as the Doctor began to lean around a cabinet to see what was hiding behind it, and she blinked rapidly realising it had been a while since she had.

"Hello," the Doctor said.

There was a loud squeal and more clattering a suddenly, running out from behind the cabinet and out the door, clad in a space suit, was – a pig? Lily fell back against the war beside the woman in shock, staring at where the pig was running.

"Don't shoot!" the Doctor shouted when the soldier on the other side of Lily raised his gun and he quickly ran after the pig.

After only a seconds hesitation Lily followed. She had just gotten out of the room when a loud bang echoed. Another soldier had shot his gun.

"What did you do that for?" the Doctor demanded of the soldier, glaring. "It was scared! It was scared."

The pig was lying on the ground and Lily moved past the Doctor to kneel at its side, looking at it curiously. Its snout and eyelashes were twitched and its breathing was laboured because of the gunshot wound in its stomach. Only semi-awe of the Doctor crouching down beside her, she reached out a hand to gently stroke its soft head. It trembled beneath her palm and her breath hitched again as a sadness seeped into her. It was scared, terrified really, and now it had taken its last breathe right in front of him.

"Doctor," Lily whimpered, not taking her eyes of the dead creature in front of her. She had never in her life witnessed death, and she felt tears fill her eyes in response to such a horrible event.

"I know," the Doctor murmured, pulled her close to him so that she could rest her head on his shoulder, seeming to guess what she was going through, and together they mourned the poor creature.

**Aliens in London**

Soon after the Doctor, Lily and the woman, Toshiko she learned her name was, were standing over the body of the pig, which was now lying on the cold, steel table in the mortuary.

"I just assumed that's what aliens look like, but you're saying it's just an ordinary pig from earth," Toshiko said.

"But I don't understand," Lily said, shaking her head and trying her best to not look at the pig in question, sure she would start crying again if she did, "it walked on its hind legs, we saw it…"

"It's like a mermaid. Victorian showmen used to drawn the crowds by taking the skull of a cat, gluing it to a fish and calling it a mermaid. Now someone's taken a pig, opened up its brain, stuck bits on, then they're strapped it in that ship and made it dive bomb. It must've been terrified. They've taken this animal and turned it into a joke," the Doctor explained, his arms crossed over his chest, his expression hard and a cold fury in his voice.

Lily felt sick to her stomach. That poor animal. It had been taken and experimented on and then forced to fly and crash and practically die, not knowing at all what was going on. The Doctor was right, it would have been downright terrified. Lily looked up at the Doctor, her blue eyes swimming with tears. His face soften in response. He reached out and squeezed her hand comfortingly and gently led her out of the room, not saying anything to Toshiko, and back to the TARDIS.

Lily was silent for a moment as the Doctor worked on the controls and the TARDIS began to wheeze as she took off.

"Is this…normal, for you?" Lily asked finally.

The Doctor looked up from what he was doing to look at Lily considering her question.

"Sometimes," he admitted, rather reluctantly.

He found himself liking Lily, liking her pure heart, and he liked Rose too, he didn't want to say anything that would cause the two of them to decide he was just too dangerous to travel with. He didn't think he could take that after the war.

Lily was quiet again, but this time for only a second before she asked, "but the other times. You get to help? You make things better? Save people?"

The Doctor nodded.

"Then it's worth it. There are so many bad things, but those are always worth it to get the good," Lily said. "My Granddad taught me that"

The Doctor looked at her for a moment before smiling softly.

"He sounds smart, your granddad," he said.

"He was," Lily said, her smile slipping only slightly. "I loved him. He always wore this ridiculous bow-tie that I just loved, and he always had things like that to say. My mum always said I inherited his kind heart"

The Doctor pressed pulled one more lever on the console and the wheezing started up again and Lily was thrown forward slightly so that she had to hold onto the console to steady herself as they landed. Practically on seconds later the TARDIS door was opening and Rose was coming inside.

"All right, so I lied," the Doctor said as he began to move around the console again to press buttons.

Lily turned and her eyes widened when she saw it wasn't just Rose that had come into the TARDIS. Mickey was there too, and Lily wanted to kick herself for being such a terrible friend, with the excitement of Rose coming home and the invitation to go with her and the Doctor, she had completely forgotten to even call Mickey to tell him about Rose's return, God knows her mum wasn't going to. However, it wasn't even just Mickey, it was her mum. She was looking about the TARDIS with completely wide, shocked eyes, but unlike Lily she didn't seem awed by the TARDIS, she seemed completely overwhelmed. Lily met Rose's eyes and her sister winced in acknowledgement to the dilemma.

"Doctor," Lily tried, wanting to make him realise they weren't alone.

"I went and had a look," the Doctor continued, not seeming to hear Lily's interruption. "But the whole crash landing's a fake. I thought so. Just too perfect. I mean, hitting big ben. Come on, so I though let's go and have a look-"

"Our mum's here," Rose said.

That caught the Doctor attention. He finally stopped faffing about the controls and looked up. His eyes going from Lily and Rose, to Mickey, to their mum and back again. He rolled his eyes with a vague expression of annoyance.

"Oh, that's just what I need," he said, before he pointed a warning finger in the direction of the Tyler sisters, "Don't you dare make this place domestic"

Mickey stepped forward now, a harsh glare on his face as he approached the Doctor.

"You ruined my life, Doctor," he said angrily and Lily winced, knowing the Doctor had unintentionally done that. "They thought she was dead. I was a murder suspect because of you"

The Doctor didn't even acknowledge Mickey before saying, "You see what I mean? Domestic" to Lily and Rose, who just shook their heads helplessly, not knowing what to do.

"I bet you don't even remember my name" Mickey said.

"Rickey," the Doctor answered almost immediately.

"It's Mickey," he replied, not seeming in the least bit impressed.

"No, it's Rickey," the Doctor disagreed.

"I think I know my own name"

"You think you know your own name?" The Doctor repeated sardonically. "How stupid are you?"

"Mum, don't!" Rose exclaimed suddenly, making Lily jump.

She looked over to where their mum was. The overwhelming feeling of the spaceship seemed to have gotten the best of her and their mum had turned heel and ran out of there, not having had the explanation from any of them on what exactly is going on.

"Don't go anywhere," Rose warned the Doctor, before saying to him and Mickey, "Don't start a fight! Lily, watch them!"

Lily gave her sister an affronted look at that. 'watch them'? She wasn't there babysitter. It wasn't her job to keep her ex-boyfriend and the alien she ran off with calm in said aliens space ship. Now there's a situation she'd never have expected to be in. she wasn't able to say anything to Rose though, as she had quickly left the TARDIS to have words with their mum.

"Okay," Lily said, trying to start up a different conversation before Mickey and the Doctor could go at it again. "I don't understand, how did we get to the seeing that the alien wasn't an alien at all, to the crash landing being fake?" she asked.

"So that was a real space ship though?" Rose said as she came back in the TARDIS.

Lily gave her a questioning look, wondering what had happened with their mum, but Rose just shook her head sadly at her. That was all the answer she needed and Lily sighed sadly. That was going to be an explanation and a half, trying to get their mum to see that what they're doing was okay.

"Yep," the Doctor replied.

"But Lily just said it was all a pack of lies," Rose pointed out. "So, what is it, then? Are they invading?"

"Funny way to invade," Mickey spoke up for the first time, "putting the world on red alert."

"Good point!" the Doctor said, looking at Mickey as though completely surprised that he could say something relevant and Lily pursed her lips at the exchange. "So, what're they up to?"

**Aliens in London**

The Doctor muttered something complicated about the TARDIS before he had set to work under the grating that made up the floor to mess with various wiring. Rose seemed much too busy worrying about what she was going to do about everything, so Lily left her sitting in the jump seat so she had some time with her thoughts, and stood with Mickey watching the Doctor work.

"So, what're you doing down there?" Mickey asked curiously and Lily had to admit that she was wondering the same thing.

The Doctor sighed in annoyance, pausing in his fiddling of the wires and removing his sonic screwdriver form his mouth to answer.

"Rickey," he started.

"Mickey," Lily and Mickey corrected together.

"Rickey," the Doctor continued as though they hadn't even interrupted. "If I was to tell you what I was doing to the controls of my frankly magnificent time ship, would you even begin to understand?"

"I suppose not," Mickey admitted, frowning.

"Well, shut it, then," the Doctor snapped, before ducking down beneath the grating again, using his sonic screwdriver on a couple more wires to his left.

Lily pursed her lips in annoyance at the exchange again and Mickey, looking half hurt and half annoyed, went to go and talk to Rose. Lily sighed, and sat down on the floor so that her legs were dangling down into the hole where the Doctor was. Mickey had always has a self-confidence problem, something that Lily had always tried to help him with, especially since her desire to be a psychologist, but this whole problem with the Doctor was just erasing all the work she had done. Rose running off with an alien that could offer her the whole of time and space and seemed to be incredibly smart too, how could Mickey feel good compared to him. He just didn't see himself in the same light as Lily saw him.

"That was mean, you know," Lily told the Doctor quietly.

The Doctor sighed.

"Well, excuse me for not particularly caring for your sister's boyfriend's stupid questions," The Doctor said in exasperation.

"He's a mechanic, he's interested!" Lily said defensively. "He was just interested in how the TARDIS works, just like he is with cars, you can't blame him for asking questions"

The Doctor didn't say anything for a moment and the way in which he continued to fiddling with wires and the whirring that came from his sonic screwdriver made her begin to think he wasn't going to.

"…did you just compare the TARDIS to a car?" the Doctor asked finally.

Lily paused, thinking back to what she had said, and ducked her head down a small reluctant laugh escaped her lips and she couldn't help but smile as the Doctor grinned up at her.

"Got it!" the Doctor exclaimed as he fiddled with the last two wires.

The Doctor pulled himself out of the floor and hopped to his feet, helping Lily get up too as he did. He went over the console and pulled down a ratty looking screen with a few knobs on it.

"Ha, ha!" he said. Patched it in the radar, looped it back twelve hours so we can follow the flight of that spaceship." He fiddled with a few knobs before a picture flickered to life on it. "Here we go. Hold on. Come on" he hit the side of the monitor so that the picture was stop being so fuzzy.

Lily and Rose shared completely bewildered looks as they looked over the Doctor's shoulders at the screen, not having any clue what they were looking at.

"That's the spaceship on its way to earth, see?" the Doctor explained, pointing. "Except. Hold on. See? The spaceship did a completely sling shot round earth before it landed"

"But that means-" Lily started.

"That it came from earth in the first place," the Doctor nodded, guessing her next words. "It went up and came back down. Whoever those aliens are, they haven't just arrived, they've been here for a while. The question is, what have they been doing?"

Lily, Mickey and Rose shared a look, not having a clue as to the answer to his question, but all feeling just as unnerved at the idea of aliens being on the earth for such a long time and coming up with such an elaborate plan.

Now that the monitor was working, Lily, Mickey and Rose began to channel-hop on the scanner, trying to find anything of any use on the TV.

"How many channels do you get?" Mickey asked as they flipped through another five channels in rapid progression.

"All the basic packages," the Doctor said absently.

"You get the sports channels?" he asked.

Lily laughed slightly. It was comforting to know that even with all this alien stuff turning her life completely on its head, Mickey still stayed the same. She smiled up at her best friend and leaned into his side in the hope to show him how much she appreciated his presence.

"Yes, I get the football," The doctor rolled his eyes, before he suddenly perked up at a particular channel Rose landed on. "Hold on, I know that lot"

"It is looking likely that the Government's bringing in alien specialists – those people who have devoted their lives to studying outer space," the woman on the TV said.

"UNIT," the Doctor elaborated at Rose's questioning look. "United Nations Intelligence Taskforce. Good people"

"How do you know them?" Rose asked.

"'Cos he's worked for them," Mickey said and the Doctor and Rose looked over at him in surprise. "Oh yeah, don't think I sat on my backside for twelve months, Doctor. Lily and I read up on you"

The Doctor turned to Lily at this point, raising a brow in her direction and crossing his arms across his chest, making Lily blush slightly.

"You'd taken my sister for a year," Lily said defensively, "what else was I supposed to do?"

The Doctor jerked his head slightly in acknowledgement of her words.

"You look deep enough on the internet or in the history books," Mickey continued, "and there's his name, followed by a list of the dead"

"That's nice," the Doctor said flatly. "Good boy, Rickey"

"If you know them," Rose cut in, trying to stop the argument before it began, "why don't you go and help?"

"They wouldn't recognise me. I've changed a lot since the old days," the Doctor said and Lily frowned, looking at him up and down. He couldn't have possibly changed so much that people he used to work with don't recognise him. "Besides, the world's on a knife-edge. There's aliens out there and fake aliens. We want to keep this alien out of the mix. Im going undercover. And er, I'd better keep the TARDIS out of sight. Rickey, you've got a car. You can do some driving"

"You could at least try to sound polite," Lily told him and the Doctor just rolled his eyes.

"Where to?" Mickey asked.

"The roads are clearing," the Doctor said. "Let's go and have a look at that space ship"

The four of them exited the TARDIS and they were immediately ambushed with the deafening sound of a helicopter above and blinded by an intense spotlight. As a reflex, Rose pulled Lily close to her side and the sisters both rose their hands to try and block out the light slightly. Lily was only vaguely aware of Mickey leaving her side as she was too focused on the police that were surrounding them.

"Do not move!" a policeman shouted. "Step away from the box and raise your hands above your heads"

Lily, Rose and the Doctor all looked about curiously. Police cars and Saxon armoured carriers surrounded them. Lily's heart was speeding in her chest, not having a clue as to what was going on, but she was starting to realise that this was what life with the Doctor was like.

"Rose! Lily!" Lily hears her mum's voice shout.

Squinting because of the spotlight, Lily looked in the direction her voice had called and saw her mum struggling with some soldiers that had grabbed her, still shouting hers and Rose's names.

"Raise your hands above your head," the Police said again. "You are under arrest"

Lily, Rose and the Doctor all did as they were asked.

"Take me to your leader," the Doctor grinned, bouncing slightly on the balls of his feet. Lily and Rose both looked over at the Doctor, not looking at all impressed with the bad joke.

It didn't take long for the Tyler sisters and the Doctor to be ushered into a sleek black car. Lily was rather confused by it if she were being honest, there were all those police cars and they were put into this fancy one, with the leather seats and tinted windows.

"This is a bit posh," Rose commented, seeming to have the same thoughts. "If I knew it was going to be like this, being arrested, I would have done it years ago"

Lily laughed.

"Oh yes, the years in a dark prison cell, so worth the trip in the fancy car," Lily mocked and Rose and the Doctor both grinned.

"We're not being arrested," the Doctor said. "We're being escorted"

Lily and Rose shared confused looks.

"Being escorted to where?" Lily asked.

"Where'd you think? Downing Street" he replied.

Lily and Rose just stared at him for a moment, gobsmacked, their eyes wide. Lily waited for the punchline, but it never came. They couldn't be going to Downing Street. Why would they be? Lily was starting to think the idea of aliens were making more sense than the actions of humans. Maybe she should go into alien psychology instead…is that even a thing? She would have to ask the Doctor.

"You're kidding," Rose said.

"I'm not," said the Doctor, a wide grin on his face,

"10 Downing Street?" Lily added, still not quite being able to believe it.

"That's the one"

"Oh, my god," Rose breathed.

Lily and Rose both suddenly broke out in grins, visibly bubbling with excitement, "We're going to 10 Downing Street!" they both exclaimed, to each to each other, giddily pulling each other in the best excited hug the car would allow. The Doctor laughed at their excitement.

"How come we're going to Downing Street?" Lily asked, still grinning.

The grin fell from the Doctors face at that.

"I hate to say it, but Mickey was right. Over the years I've visited this planet a lot of times, and I've been, er, noticed" the Doctor said, grimacing slightly.

"Now they need you?" asked Rose.

"Like it said on the news. They're gathering experts in alien knowledge, and who's the biggest expert of the lot?" the Doctor had a rather smug smile at this, and Lily noticed that he had quite a big ego for someone who held so much self-loathing.

"Patrick Moore?" Rose suggested, making Lily laugh.

The Doctor huffed, "Apart from him"

"Oh, don't you just love it," Rose and Lily grinned, leaning back in the swanky seats and looking at the Doctor with bright eyes.

"I'm telling you," said the Doctor. "Lloyd George, he used to drink me under the table. Who's the Prime Minister now?"

"How should we know? She's missed a year and I've been too worried wondering when she was going to come back to pay attention to much of anything," Lily said.

When the car finally pulled to a stop, the Doctor climbed out and Rose and Lily followed. They were assaulted instantly by a large crowd of people and news teams with cameras. The Doctor grinned for the cameras, while Lily and Rose flinched from all the bright lights.

"Oh, my God," Lily and Rose breathed at the same time as the crowd shifted and they were led up to number ten.

**Aliens in London**

When they got inside, the entrance hall was flooded with UNIT officers and other high clearance people, all of which were talking amongst themselves and stipulating what they thought could be going on.

"Ladies and gentlemen, can we convene?" an Indian man called, trying to quiet everyone. "Quick as we can, please. It's this way on the right, and can I remind you ID cards are to be worn at all times. He's your ID card," he said as he handed one to the Doctor. "I'm sorry, your companions don't have clearance," he added, when Lily, Rose and the Doctor went to enter the door that had been indicated.

"I don't go anywhere without them," the Doctor said, grabbing one of Lily's and Rose's hands in each of his and holding up for the man to see to prove his point.

"You're the cod nine, not her," the man said patiently. "I'm sorry, Doctor. It is the Doctor, isn't it? They'll have to stay outside"

"They're staying with me," the Doctor insisted.

"Look, even I don't have clearance to go in there," the man said, "I can't let them in and that's a fact"

Lily frowned when she saw that the Doctor looked ready to argue again. She was flattered at how hard he was trying to keep them with him, but the man did seem honestly apologetic.

"What's your name?" she asked him.

The man looked rather surprised, and she supposed he mustn't get asked that a lot.

"Ganesh, ma'am," he replied and Lily smiled kindly in response.

"Well, thank you, Ganesh, I'm Lily. I'm sure we'll be find out here, won't we Rose?" Lily asked, the smile never leaving her face.

"Yeah, it's all right. You go," Rose told the Doctor and Lily nodded encouragingly.

"Excuse me. Are you the Doctor?" an older woman asked as she approached them from the crowd.

"Sure," the Doctor grinned. For a national crisis he sure seemed to be enjoying this an awful lot.

In contrast to the Doctor, Lily was surprised to see Ganesh have such a negative reaction to the woman, in fact he seemed rather annoyed by her.

"Not now," he told her sharply. We're busy. Can't you go home?" he sighed in exasperation.

"I just need a word in private," the woman said to the Doctor, not seeming at all put off by Ganesh's reaction to her.

"I suppose so," the Doctor replied. "Don't get into any trouble," the Doctor told Lily and Rose as he left in the direction all the other experts went. The sisters shared amused looks and rolled their eyes. It was hardly going to be them who got into trouble, it was normally the Doctor who ran head long into it.

"You haven't got clearance. Now leave it," Ganesh told the woman firmly when she went to follow, before he turned to Lily and Rose. "I'm going to have to leave you with security"

"It's alright, I'll look after them," the woman put in quickly, the man looked rather sceptical. "Let me be of some use." She grabbed Lily and Rose by their elbows and began to rapidly lead them away before Ganesh could get another word in. "Walk with me. Just keep walking," the woman said lowly, and Lily and Rose said a bewildered look around her. "That's right. Don't look around. Harriet Jones, MP Flydale North," she said as she showed them her card. "This friend of yours, he's an expert, is that right? He knows about aliens?" she asked as they rounded the corner.

"Why do you want to know?" Rose asked suspiciously.

Much to the sister's shock, the woman put a hand over her mouth and began to cry. Lily quickly moved forward and wrapped her arms around the woman, rubbing her arm comfortingly and making soothing noises.

"It's okay," Lily muttered.

"Why don't you tell us what's wrong," Rose suggested softly.

**Aliens in London**

Harriet hadn't told them what was wrong, but she had consoled herself enough to lead them to the cabinet room and show them what was bothering her. Harriet handed it to Rose as she explained. It was clear that what it was used to be a person. Rose held it, looking at the zip on the forehead, but Lily could barely even look at it without feeling like she wanted to throw up, never mind touch it.

"They turned the body into a suit," Harriet was saying, still sounding rather shaky, and Lily was in no confusion as to why. "A disguise for the thing inside!"

"It's all right. We believe you. It's, it's alien. They must have some serious technology behind this. If we could find it, we could use it." Rose said and began searching the room.

"Rose I'm not sure. Even if it is a machine that…converts bodies into suits…" Lily swallowed looking pale, "I don't think we'll be able to use it to help us"

Lily was starting to wish the Doctor had just stayed with them, he would know what to do. Lily didn't know the first thing about Aliens, and Rose, even though she had been on a few trips with the Doctor, obviously didn't know much more.

Rose didn't answer and just opened a different cupboard. Lily gasped loudly and Harriet covered her mouth. A man's body had fallen out. It was the Prime Minister.

"Oh, my God," Lily cried in horror, moving to stand by Rose and pulled her away from the body slightly, holding onto her sister's arm so tightly her knuckles went white. This was the second dead body she had seen today and this was even worse as this was a person.

"Is that the…" Rose started, but was cut off by the door opening.

"Harriet, for God's sake," Ganesh snapped in annoyance as he entered the cabinet room. "This has gone beyond a joke. You cannot just wander – oh, my God. That's the Prime Minister!" he exclaimed, his eyes widening as he caught sight of the body.

A portly blonde woman with a blue suit walked in then, her small heel clicking slightly on the floor. She wore a deceptively sweet smile on her lips.

"Oh! Has someone been naught?" she asked in a tone that made Lily's insides freeze and she tightened her grip on Rose.

"That's impossible," Ganesh cried. "He left this afternoon. The Prime Minister left Downing Street. He was driven away!"

"And who told you that, hmm?" the portly woman asked in a tone one would use with a child. "Me." she reached up to her hairline and Lily was horrified to see that right there, on her left temple – was a zip.

**Author's Note: PLEASE REVIEW!**


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